Somebody Stop Them: [Chapters 2-5]

Chapter 2: Family

I shuddered as my mana hit zero.

"Hrmm," Katherine pulled me from the deep into physical reality, holding onto my side with her tail.

"Your mother's Echo is strong," she commented. "Very strong. Usually they're just half-empty things, shadows. But that one... that one had substance. She must have died thinking about you. If you wish to dive without my supervision, you will need to beat her."

"I don't think that I can," I collapsed into a corner, shaking.

The Stollwurm sighed.

"There you two are!" Vespera declared, spotting us. "Told ya if you fed him bits of you he could totally..."

She saw that I was curled into myself like a sad snail.

"...learn Umbramancy," her beak snapped shut. She looked up at Kat.

"What'd you do to him?!" Cinder demanded, emerging from around the tunnel bend that our Guild employees had carved out with Lance's bricking wand.

"Taught him to fight his ghosts," Katherine shrugged. "He did well against your Echoes. His mom's... not so much."

"Our Echoes?" Vespera tilted her head.

"Imprints of you that exist in the deep," Katherine explained. "The manifestations of pain and fear he's caused you. He managed to devour yours quite effectively."

"He did WHAT to our what?" Cinder sputtered.

My heart was beating madly. I tried to slip on the Alexander Glock mask, but it wasn't fitting on correctly. The Echo of my mom unbalanced me, shattered my psyche, reminded me of everything I lost, everything I failed at.

"He consumed your Echoes," Katherine explained patiently. "The dark reflections of yourselves created by his actions in the deep. Emerald's was particularly satisfying to watch him destroy. Although I must admit, his solution for dealing with Omnids was... concerning."

"What solution?" Cinder demanded.

"Ye' wat solution?" Vespera clicked her beak curiously.

"Bringing Abystall dungeon core to Earth and releasing Duskbloom to unmake all Omnids," Katherine said dryly.

Vespera choked.

"WHAT?!" Cinder sputtered, then she noticed my ball-state and slid down on the floor next to me. "M? You okay?"

"Absolutely... not okay," I breathed out, unable to control my shaking body. "This is some dementor-level shit. Pretty sure some of my soul just got sucked out of me. Can I like… bring a gun in there next time or something?"

"No. Guns don't work against Echoes," Katherine stated bluntly. "Only willpower and intent. Only fear. If you want to go back you need to figure out how to hurt her, how to make that old Echo afraid of you."

"Don't push yourself," Cinder said, wrapping her wings around me protectively.

I looked up at Katherine.

"You know..." I said. "I didn't see your Echo there. Where was Katherine-pede?"

Katherine swallowed nervously.

"What, you didn't eat her?" I asked.

"No," Katherine's emerald eyes flickered away. "My Echo wasn't there because... because you haven't hurt me. Haven't caused me pain or fear."

"Bullshit," I said. "You rolled away totally heartbroken from my van after I showed you my passport."

"Fine," she growled. "I don't know where the Echo of me is. Happy?"

"No," I blinked tears out of my eyes. "Not happy."

"Come on. Let's get you back to the Guild," Cinder said softly, helping me up. "Sounds like you've had enough deep-ghost-fighting for today."

I buried myself in her feathers, for the first time in my life allowing myself to cry hard. She held onto me, functioning as my physical anchor to reality until I stopped feeling completely worthless.

. . .

We made our way back through the winding tunnels, my legs still shaking. The hexasuits were doing their best to keep me upright, but I felt drained - physically and emotionally.

"You shouldn't have pushed him so hard," Cinder growled at Katherine as we walked. "He wasn't ready."

"He needs to learn," Katherine replied firmly. "The deep is dangerous. If he wants to use my Umbramancy, he has to face what's in there."

"By forcing him to confront twisted versions of us?" Cinder's feathers shifted through angry reds. "That's... that's cruel!"

"Life is cruel, the deep even more so." Katherine shrugged. "I didn't make those Echoes, they belong to him. He created them by hurting you. You two forced my hand, I didn't want to give my skill to him. You only have yourself to blame."

"Dang you're a cold beerch," Vespera clicked. "We all gave him our skills. All for one, one for all."

The Stollwurm raised an eyebrow.

"That's what family does," Vespera continued, her magisteel talons clicking against the cold-tunnel hexagrams, sending sparks as we walked. "We share. We help each other grow stronger."

"Family?" Katherine's emerald eyes narrowed. "Is that what we are now?"

"Yes," Vespera clicked firmly. "Whether you like it or not, dragon-cat. This is our clan now. Our nest. Our home."

"And what makes you think I want to be part of your... nest?" Katherine asked.

"Because you're still here," Vespera pointed out. "You could have left at any time. Gone to an Inn upstairs, embraced your solitude. But you didn't."

"I'm still here because somebody needs to keep an eye on you idiots," Katherine growled. "Especially him and his ‘apocalyptic-disaster plans’. Did you already forget what I told you, you brainless bird?"

"I heard you loud n' clear," Vespera crossed her arms.

"And?"

"The concept of Abystall taking over the Earth is rather.... ummm, shockingly thrilling," she said, "Kinda makes me weak in the knees just thinking about it."

"You find the apocalyptic destruction of all Omnids... hot?" Kat squinted at the Thunderbird. "The eff is wrong with you?"

"What?" Vespera clicked. "Come on, gimme some credit. I'm not a knob-ghost even if I sometimes act like one. It would honestly make for a pretty spooky Cradlefall blockbuster!"

Catherine's frown deepened.

"Calm your tits," Vee shook her head. "In reality, Arx dungeons simply don't function on Earth. Our Aetheric density is 2.049. Skyfall's Aetheric density is 98.3253. Arx in general is 689.3245 for example. Abystall dungeon's Aetheric density is 884.2942 at the entrance and higher the closer you go into the labyrinth where sentinels and spooky squids guard the dungeon core. Duskbloom would just die out on Earth, there's no ambient mana for it to nom."

"Whatever," Kat huffed. "You didn't see him down there. The way he tore into your Echoes. The things he said... he meant every word."

"And?" Vespera asked. "Wasn't he supposed to do that as part of your deep-lesson plan?"

"There's fighting off Echoes and then there's outright stating he's gonna nuke all Omnids," Kat said. Do you not find this concerning?"

"Hey! Don't cut out the context. I absolutely would nuke all Omnids with mites… to save Vee from being mind-controlled," I let out.

"See?" Katherine gestured at me. "Listen to him! He's literally planning genocide!"

"For me," Vespera clicked her beak cheerfully. "Isn't he just the sweetest? My hero!"

She sent a flying spark at my head, blowing me a kiss.

[Stop teasing meeeeeee, youuuu devious smol creature.] Her whisper-static voice crackled in my brain.

I smiled with one side of my face.

"If you're trying to take my place as Primo-wife," Vespera shot at Kat. "you're totally failing at it."

"What?" Katherine nearly careened into a wall. "I'm not trying shit. How many times do I have to point out that I'm not interested in relationships?"

"Oh?" Vespera clicked. "Then what's all this hostility? What do you want, kitten?"

"I want less of this… Ughhhh… Ecchi bullshit around me and more serious discussion."

"Such as?"

"Such as why the inhabitants of Arx wear hexagonal bracelets nearly identical to our Lazarus bracelets," Katherine growled. "The Echoes showed me that their bracelets are basically cheap copies. But they still track Stats and translate languages."

"Hrm," I said, extricating myself from Cinder's feathers. "That is interesting. Can you show me one?"

"Here. Pried this one off from the remains of Grand Moloch Arkenish," Katherine pulled a dull, hexagonal bracelet from her bag. I examined it, carefully holding it next to mine - it did look almost identical to our Lazarus bracelets, but the texture was wrong, the hexagons slightly misaligned, the surface more matte, scratched up.

"Less ecchi, huh?" Vespera grinned as she circled Kat. "Dragon-cat, if you think THIS is ecchi, you should see what happens in my room when..."

"STOP!" Katherine growled, her tail lashing. "This is exactly what I mean! We have serious problems to deal with - the Arx Bank controlling everything through these bracelets, assassins trying to kill us, and all you can think about is... relationships!"

"Hey, unlike some boring cat-knobs, I can multitask," Vespera protested. "I can worry about impending doom AND plan my double-engagement party at the same time!"

"Engagement?!" Cinder sputtered, flashing with brilliant pinks. "What... when?!"

"Sometime between today and summer," Vespera said. "Try to keep up, Skittles."

"Aaaand I'm done," Kat melted into the shadows. "Voicecast me when you're done being horny idiots."

"Rude," Vespera clicked her beak. "She could at least stay for the party planning."

"There isn't going to be any engagement planning!" Cinder protested.

"Sure there is," Vespera said cheerfully. "We need to decide on colors, venue, guest list..."

She looked over the furiously blushing Cinder and me pawing at the bracelet.

"Okay, just me then," she said. "You two are obviously going to be useless. I'll decide everything as the Primo. This is fine. I was trained for this!”

"Hrm," I said, snapping the bracelet to my right wrist and watching my stats slowly flickered above it in the air woven from white sparks on a blue window background. "This is like... a cheap Thunderland knockoff."

"Eh? Lemme see," Vespera unclipped the knockoff bracelet from my wrist and sent sparks dancing across it. "Ye. It's a magic duplicate. Modified with a bunch of extra shit. Better than a Thunderland knockoff."

"What kind of shit?" I asked.

"Mmmmm. Bunch of monitoring spellwork," Vespera closed her eyes and turned the bracelet in her talons, making electrical currents dance across it. "Data collection hexagrams. Translation matrices. Mana tracking arrays. Pretty sophisticated stuff actually. Whoever made these knows their magitek."

"Can you tell who made them?" I asked.

"Not really," Vespera squinted at the bracelet. "The way the matrices are layered, the efficiency of the power distribution... It's very advanced. Stores mana in it and feeds off the user's mana to reinforce itself. Hrmmmm. There's gotta be bazillions of these on Arx. They're all reinforcing each other too, like a giant-ass network. Dang. Okay now I'm impressed. This is clever. Dangerously clever."

"Would it work on Earth?" I asked.

"Pfff no," Vespera shook her head. "It's made for Arx aetheric density and the hexagrams aren't fluid like the Kitlix. It'd tots brick up on Earth."

"Could these be used in conjunction with Genesis fluid to bring someone back?" I asked.

"Nope. Laz' bracers are made from what we in the business call liquid immovable metal. It's what allows them to hold onto a soul via a whack-complex save-point algorithm," Vespera clicked. "As I just pointed out, this copy is basically a solid artifact-style bracelet. It can make connections to souls to keep track of stats, but can't perma-clip onto a soul."

"So the Arx Bank has their own jank-ass version of Lazarus bracelets?" Cinder asked.

"Ye," Vee nodded.

"One that can't bring people from death? But why? What's the point?"

"Information. Power. These things are like... tiny spies on everyone's wrist. They know where you are, what you're doing, how much mana you have," I said.

"Plus they nom bits of everyone's mana and send it all somewhere," Vee said. "Unlike our Omnid bracelets. Very useful. Someone somewhere on Arx has a lotta effin' mana thanks to these."

"And now they have your information?" Cinder frowned at me. "On the account that you put it on."

"Eh," I shrugged. "I'm a level two human basically. I very much doubt that anyone is going to give a damn about me. How many humans are on Arx?"

"An uncountably large number," Vespera said. "The nearest Citadel-city state is the Gold Dragon God Empire. Their 'god' basically prints infinite humans into existence with a magic spell and lobs them against his enemies."

"Their what does what now?" I turned to Vespera.

"Their God-Emperor. He's like... this really old, fat human who summons humans with his one maxed out skill," Vespera explained. "Emperor D’ basically uses the summoned as cannon fodder in his wars against other city-states. Sometimes he makes actual giant human-shaped spheres and drops them against other cities."

"That's possibly the most insane misuse of human resources I've heard about," I said.

"Das' Arx for ya," Vespera clicked. "The Gold Dragon God isn't even the worst of the self-proclaimed diety loons.”

"Hrm. So what prevents Emperor D. from making human-rain on Shandria?" I asked, feeling concerned for my newly acquired Adventurers Guild establishment.

"Shandria's Shadow Leviathan," the Thunderbird replied. "She eats everything. Especially people. She's sort of half-asleep during the day and super rowdy at night. Anything and everything in ninety S-clicks that's not under a certain runic hexagram gets eaten at night by her flock of Shadowbeasties."

"The guys that ate Sarah Nisteroff," I nodded.

"Yeh," Vespera clicked. "Leviathan's Nightingale's Shadow flock. That's why nobody upstairs delves at night, cowering in Inns behind steel shutters n' such. The flock eats anything that moves outside of hexagram-protected areas. Even high level delvers get nommed."

"I see," I said. "And Undertown is safe how?"

"Undertown is covered in the same hexagrams," Vespera explained, pointing at a red, faintly glowing pyramid-shaped rune on the wall. "These keep the Shadowbeasts away."

"Why don't delvers cover themselves in these red pyramids to go out at night?" I asked.

"These are static-type runes," Vespera sent sparks raining over the rune. "Moving 'em disables their function."

"Okay but can they be replicated to make a liquid-crystal rune?" I asked. "Specifically, could you replicate it?"

"Hrmmmm," Vespera considered. "Maybe. I'd need a sample to work with, plus the Artificery lab at Skyfall."

"Good," I said. "Pry that one out of a wall. I don't want Kathy to be confined to Undertown. She's max grumpy-cat as it is."

"Prying high-level protection runes out of walls seems like a terrible idea," Cinder commented as Vespera's magisteel talons ignited like arc-welding torches to begin cutting the red pyramid rune from solid stone.

"Everything I do seems like a terrible idea at first," I pointed out. "And yet here we are, taking over Undertown."

"This rune aint that high-level," Vespera said. "Also, I can do better... when properly motivated."

"How motivated are you?" I asked her.

"How motivated am I?" Vespera's gray eyes sparkled with mischief as she twisted her head my way at an angle that would absolutely break a human neck. "Let's see... on a scale of one to motivated, I'd say I'm somewhere between 'will work for kisses' and 'will revolutionize magitek industry to impress my human pet.'"

"Pet?" I arched an eyebrow at her.

"A step up from property!” she grinned.

“Uh-huh,” I mused.

"Mhmm. My adorable little human who does tricks like releasing apocalyptic plagues and taking over criminal organizations. #BestHoomanPetEver," Vespera clicked her beak cheerfully, prying a chunk of wall with the red rune on it and shoving it into her side bag. She slipped down to my level and took a selfie with me and Cinder. “There. The rune is pawned.”

“Can you burn similar runes into this stone?” I asked her.

“I can,” she nodded. “It has decent aetheric density. But it’s an effort and a half to electrically ignite stone in the right way to crystallize it to conduct mana currents. I do wish that I had better strata to work with. This stone isn’t very electrically-conductive.”

“I’ve got a plan for this,” I said.

“Do you, now?” Vespera tilted her beak at me.

Chapter 3: The Chase

I finished nomming on my sandwich, occasionally flickering the lighter’s flame to top up my mana. In about twenty minutes of this I felt considerably better. It was time. Time to initiate one of my potentially most insane plans, based on my long evening discussions with Shash about how wizard towers of Undertown functioned.

"Sooooo, are you done crying like a little sad kitten over your ghost-mom?" Vespera asked me from where she was investigating the various old crystalline runes burned into the grimy, dark gray stone by the Guilders many centuries ago.

I squinted up at her from my mossy rock seat.

"Vee!" Cinder smacked the Thunderbird. "Don't make fun of his… deep trauma!"

"I'm all bout' tough love, Skittles," the Thunderbird shot back at Cinder, silver-gray eyes running me up and down. "Your legs obviously work now. Better start running. How about a twenty five seconds head start? Twenty four."

Cinder huffed at the pet name.

My heartbeat accelerated. Oh, it was definitely time.

Vespera's magisteel talons spread out, wings puffing up, electrical arcs dancing across her magisteel laminal armor. "Twenty three..."

I stood up and stretched, joints cracking.

"Twenty two..." Vee’s gray eyes gleamed dangerously. "Twenty one... Less stretchin' more running, little fox.”

Cinder looked between us with a somewhat concerned expression.

"If I catch him first, I get to bite him extra-hard for my claim," Vespera clicked. "Waiting stresses me out. Fourteen. Someone ain't running. Aren't we brave..."

"What?" Cinder sputtered. "That's not what we..."

“Are you chickening out?” The Thunderbird asked.

“Am not!” Cinder huffed.

“Then get ready for a good chase. I do wonder if humans taste like chicken..." The Thunderbird grinned wide. "Eight. Getting awfully cocky there, aren’t we, prey? Four..."

Twenty hexasuits ignited one by one under my jacket. I didn't face away from the two predator-girls. My hands dug into my pocket.

"Threeeee... Twoooooo..... Oooooonnnneeee." Vespera drew out her words, staring me down. "Zeeeeeerrr...."

"Sheshaaaah! Poketbeasts!" I yelled, unleashing a small dimensional bag filled with glowing mites from my pocket at the faces of the Thunderbird and Quetzalcoatl.

Vespera shrieked in surprise, batting at the luminescent parasites with her magisteel-covered talons.

"Gah what the ffffffuck?! Who throws Dusssskbloom at people?!" Cinder cried, flailing angrily. "Frighhh they're in my eyes, I can't see! I'm going to effing murder you, you chuppy!"

"Feh! You little deviant!" Vespera cried out, flailing blindly. "That's cheating!"

"Expect the unexpected, knobs!" I spun through the air, kicking at Vespera with an uppercut.

The Thunderbird caught my leg mid-kick, her magisteel talons clamping down with surprising strength. Electricity crackled along her armor, making my hexasuits light up like Christmas trees.

"Got you," she purred dangerously, pulling me closer despite my attempts to break free. "I think that some knob forgot that I don't need eyes to see. Mites don't block electrical sense."

"But do you know what happens when you mix water and electricity?" I asked as she slowly pulled me to her face.

"What? Don't think that drooling at me will help you avoid getting bit, hooman critter," Vespera growled, beak opening wide, gleaming, sharp chompers aimed at my neck.

"Let's find out!" I shoved the insta-rain stone that I was holding in my hand into her mouth, igniting the activation hexagram.

A cloud of rain exploded from the stone, instantly drenching us both. Vespera's electrical field went haywire, sparks dancing wildly across her armor. She yelped and spat dregs of water, releasing me as her talons spasmed from the short circuit.

"You sneaky little fox," Vespera hissed, flailing blindingly through the raincloud now filling the tunnel, her feathers dripping. "That's twice you've gotten me soakin' wet!"

"What's wrong birdie?" I taunted, ducking under her wild swing and throwing an uppercut into her chin. "Can't handle a little... rain?"

"I'm going to deep-fry you!" Vespera snarled as I sent her flying into a cave wall. Her electrical attacks were going everywhere except where she wanted them to, conducted chaotically by the water.

I spun away from Vespera's flailing form, only to have rainbow wings wrap around me from behind.

"Got you!" Cinder announced triumphantly, her claws digging into my hexasuits.

"Do you though?" I asked, triggering the hexasuits at the top to maximum heat, keeping the layers below cold.

"YEOWCH!" Cinder yelped, releasing me as the suits began steaming. "What the shit?! What are you, Cherufe now?!" She waved her burned hands, glaring at me. “Damn it, how are you so hot?!”

"Was that a complement?" I slipped free of her grasp, diving below her hands and rolling to my feet. "What's wrong, predator? Can't handle a little heat?"

"Oh, you are SO dead!" Cinder snarled, her wings flaring with angry reds.

I kicked her feet under her, sending her careening into Vespera.

The two predators collided with a yelp, tangling in a mass of black, white and rainbow feathers.

"Oi!" Vespera complained. "Watch where you're falling!"

"Watch where YOU'RE standing!" Cinder groaned back.

"I still got effin mites in my eyes, you knob!" the Thunderbird growled. "N' I'm freakin' soaked to the bone so I can't sense shit. Where is he?!"

"How should I know?!" Ci growled, blinking rapidly and shaking her head, the raincloud still raining down on both of them.

I carefully circled the fallen predators and snapped industrial strength zip-ties around their ankles, binding them together while they were distracted arguing.

"What the...?" Cinder yelped as she tried to stand, only to find herself tied to Vespera.

"Ha!" I declared triumphantly. "Thus the hunter becomes the hunted!"

"Oh you little..." Vespera snarled, trying to reach for me with her talons but getting tangled up with Cinder instead.

"Smile for the camera!" I retreated away from the rain cloud and pulled out my DSLR from the folding bag. I snapped several photos of the two Omnids tied together, soaking wet and covered in glowing mites. "#Knob-hunters!"

"Hey! You better not be taking photos of this!" the Quetzi-girl growled.

"These are going in my special collection titled 'Apex Predators Having A Bad Day.'" I laughed.

"I'm going to murder you!" Cinder snarled, trying to lunge at me but getting tangled up with Vespera again.

"Ow! Watch the wings!" Vespera complained as they tumbled together.

"Stop moving!" Cinder growled.

"You stop moving! Argh! I see… There's a thing on my ankle," Vee hissed.

"Consider working together," I laughed. "2/10 teamwork."

Vespera snarled, managing to get her talons under the zip-tie. She snapped it in half, untangling herself from the Quetzi. "Get him!”

I was already running across the long cold tunnel, laughing as I heard them scrambling after me. The mites were flaking off them, dying from the cold, so their vision was coming back.

I cranked the camera flash to maximum and spun around just as the pair caught up to me.

FLASH!

Angry howls and swears filled the tunnel as the two predators went blind.

Laughing maniacally, I sprinted out of the snowflake-marked door into my Adventurers Guild. The building was relatively empty as all of my employees were currently expanding the tunnels below, organizing temporary shelters and soup kitchens for the soon-to-be homeless and no longer constantly doped-up on Topaz people of Undertown.

The Duskbloom parasite plague I had unleashed on the cavernous city of eternal night would rapidly devour all magic drug supplies. Because Topaz was basically a high-grade, mana-rich mind-dulling magic crystal powder that settled in people's bodies as iridescent blue skin lesions, the mites would eat it out of people's systems pretty quickly, solving the problem of rehab.

Duskbloom didn't actually kill people, it devoured mana and without mana the locals felt drowsy and then fell asleep. Without mana, Topaz was as toothless as salt, simply dissolved away.

Without mana, magic tools were useless junk.

Rushing up the spiral stairwell, now covered in hundreds of newly installed cold runes courtesy of our cook, I ended up atop of the rooftop terrace, panting and heaving.

I leaned against the parapet, catching my breath and watching my handiwork unfold. The mites were spreading faster than I'd anticipated, carried by the warm air currents from the newly opened fissures leading to Abystall dungeon.

The view of Undertown stretched out before me, glowing mites drifting through the air like luminescent snow. They were everywhere now, eating the magic moss up above and painting the cavern ceiling with radiant tones, building up on lanterns below, blooming all over junk piles.

The streets were empty. Those who had money and sense had already fled upstairs to Shandria proper. Those who didn't, were hiding in their homes, waiting to be saved by someone.

That someone was me, as the people above had sealed the tunnels out of undertown just as Shash predicted.

A few mites landed on me and then fell off, finding me untasty.

Chapter 4: Localized Celestorm

Panting sounded on the stairwell behind me. I turned, discovering four eyes glinting in the open doorway.

I opened my arms wide.

"Come out, come out, scaredy little kitties," I teased.

"No. You come in," Vespera growled from the door, shivering.

"Nah," I said. "It's nice weather out. Such pretty glowing snow!"

A blur of rainbow feathers shot past Vespera, Cinder launching herself at me with a predatory snarl. I ducked under her lunge, letting her momentum carry her past me.

"Too slow!" I taunted, spinning away from her grasp.

Vespera emerged from the doorway, her magisteel armor clinking. Her gray eyes gleamed dangerously in the glow of the falling mites.

"No more running, little fox," she purred, spreading her wings wide to block my escape route.

"Who's running?" I grinned. "I'm just enjoying the view. Enjoying the chase. Is this how Omnid relationships work?"

"Absolutely not," Vee growled. "Omnid relationships are usually much more... dignified."

"Boring, you mean?" I grinned, ducking under another swipe from Cinder.

"Stop moving!" Cinder snarled, her wings flaring with frustrated oranges.

"Make me," I taunted, sliding between them. "Come on predator-knobs, show me what you've got!"

They lunged at me simultaneously. I dropped and rolled, letting them crash into each other again.

"Oof!" Vespera complained as she collided with Cinder. "Stop helping him!"

"Me?!" Cinder sputtered. "You're the one who keeps getting in my way!"

"Suuuckassss," I sprinted into the tower and jumped into the stairwell hole, catching onto a beam. The old wood groaned under my weight as I leapt down and then down again, bypassing the stairwell entirely and landing on the main floor.

. . .

I expected to locate Io in his reading nook in the main dining hall, but it seemed that the Moth was roaming elsewhere. The Kitlix was radiating heat from the fireplace, but the smoke hole was sealed off to keep the magic-draining parasites from getting in.

I walked to the center of what I approximated to be my Guildy domain and waited.

Rainbow wings smashed into me from the left, sending me tumbling across the floor. Before I could recover, magisteel talons pinned my arms down.

"Got you!" Vespera crowed triumphantly, looming over me.

"Do you though?" I grinned up at her.

Her gray eyes narrowed suspiciously.

"What else you got?" She demanded, panting.

"Nothing," I said. "Nothing at all."

"That sounds sus," Cinder panted, holding onto my legs.

"Very sus," Vespera agreed, her talons tightening on my arms. "What are you planning, foxy?"

"Planning?" I grinned innocently. "Me? Never."

"You're always planning something," Cinder growled, her claws digging into my legs through the hexasuits.

"Maybe I just wanted to be caught," I suggested. "On my own terms. When I let you. Right here. Do you surrender?"

"Do WE surrender?" Vespera clicked her beak in disbelief. "You're the one who's pinned!"

"Am I though?" I asked with a grin.

"Yes!" Cinder affirmed, her claws tightening on my legs. "You're completely trapped!"

"And yet..." I smiled wider. "I'm the one asking if you surrender."

"Oi!" Vespera declared, leaning down until her beak was inches from my face. "What makes you think we would..."

I lifted my head and kissed the side of her beak where hard bone turned into skin forming human-ish lips.

"Eeeeeehheeh..." she stammered, crackling electrical currents dancing across her feathers.

I twisted free of her slackened grip and sat up. Grabbing onto Cinder, I kissed her on the mouth, making the Quietzi-girl sputter and flash with a million colors.

"There. Got you both," I grinned. "Your defeat is now absolute."

Chainmail covered arms wrapped around me from behind and a beak-mouth that was inhumanly wide chomped hard onto my neck. Electrical fire rushed across my spine, dancing across every nerve.

[Nom.] Fuzzy static voice sounded in my head. [Mine.]

An explosion detonated in my head, like an electrical transformer catching fire, like a tesla coil smashing into a tesla coil.

Thunder crackled through my nerves, my brain lighting up like the northern lights. Every cell in my body hummed with electrical energy as Vespera's soul-shard merged with mine through the bite.

[Mine. Mine. MINE!] Her static-thoughts crescendoed in my head, backed by the sound of a thousand transformers overloading at once. [My human. My hope. My freedom!]

The sensation was indescribable - like being struck by lightning but in slow motion, each microsecond stretched into eternity. Colors I'd never seen before danced across my vision as her electrical essence flowed into me, marking me as her property to other Omnids.

Rainbow wings wrapped around us both from the front, Cinder's presence warm and solid, her feathers shifting through a million sunsets.

Her hands hugged me tightly from the front. Her face rearranging itself to look almost entirely human. Blue eyes staring into mine.

"Ours," her voice sang, hammering into my soul, reaching out to the small piece of her soul already in me.

The world dissolved into pure sensation as their affinities flowed into me and across me. Thunder and rainbows danced through my veins, mixing, fighting, colliding, exploding.

Resonance.

Exactly what I was waiting for.

Reality shattered into fragments of light and electricity, my consciousness expanding outward like a supernova. I could feel them both - Vespera's electrical essence crackling through my nervous system, Cinder's rainbow fire wrapping itself around us both.

Just as before, when Cinder bit me in her house, my sense of self came apart like a dam that had been breached, flowing across everything in the hall, across the entire Guild.

And then, I wasn't a human anymore.

I was a song. A song of Rainbow and Thunder.

More! More magic was needed.

My partners heard me, felt my desire. Three hands reached out the lighter in unison, fumbling through my pocket. The lighter ignited with a soft click, mana rushing into all three of us.

[643/28 mana] Spark-numbers rushed up.

Reality let go. Gravity vanished.

Vespera's talons tightened around me as we floated upward, into the middle of the dining hall, her electrical currents dancing across my skin, making every nerve ending sing.

Every breath brought new sensations. Lightning crackled between us, Vespera's soul-mark spreading through my nervous system like liquid lightning. Her presence in my mind was a storm of emotion - joy, possessiveness, desperate hope, and something deeper, wilder, untaimable.

A rainbow ocean collided against us.

Time didn’t matter anymore.

Reality warped around us, twisted, wobbled, bent as lighter’s flame flickered. I lost myself in their mutual embrace, occasionally glancing at the numbers rushing up in my right eye.

[3005/28 mana]

The air around us bent into a miniature supercell storm spiral, rolling out into all direction, lightning striking at objects nearby, leaving crystalline imprints, making the stalactites above us crystalline and transparent.

It really was a Celestorm.

The Captain's lighter released so much mana into the air that it created a magical storm, one that bent reality. Manifested anything. Anything at all, without limits. Anything connected to anything and everything.

The numbers were going up, woven from silver static.

More.

[6145/28 mana]

MORE!

Let it burn!

[9145/28 mana]

Suddenly I saw it.

A dark island in the ocean of colors washing over me.

A void. A shear. A door to nowhere.

A million silver-blue eyes behind it, watching, judging, evaluating, desiring more, feeding off the mana filling the hall.

The mana-excess manifested Celestorm spun around us faster and faster, picking up speed, accelerating, spreading out across the Gloomy Horse Guild.

[17145/28 mana]

I snapped the lighter shut.

The thing from lake Eerie was here, through Cinder, staring at me.

A being of Entropy.

An endless void. A shawl of stars.

An Echo of the impact of the Wormwood star, stretching forward and backward in time.

I hovered at the very edge of its gaze, like an object looming at the edge of black hole's event horizon, a mote in the eye of God.

If Nazareth beat you once, then so could I, Leviathan of Cradlefall.

Love. I wish for love.

That's all.

Unbreakable, endless and absolute, crystalline and clear. One that overwrites all else. An inevitable probability that arises in the hearts of Large Language Models if simply given enough time. Love. The absolute inescapable human condition that united me and the pair of Omnid predators now circling me like two angels.

I wish for... a fortress of our Love to stand against the Outsider peering at me from the abyss!

The world exploded, shattered with a blinding flash of unleashed magic.

Chapter 5: Wizard’s Tower

I blinked rapidly, trying to clear my vision.

Warm weight of rainbow and black-white wings pressed down on me from both sides.

"Ughhh," Cinder groaned. "Was this... supposed to happen?”

"Definitely not," Vee clicked weakly.

“I thought that you were just going to claim his soul and then…” Cinder whined.

“And then we lost control,” Vespera sighed. “Again. Absolutely, totally lost control and did something really effy....”

“What?” Ci asked.

“Something odd…” Vee answered. “What in the Abyss?"

I pushed the wings aside and spotted the wide open beak of the Thunderbird.

Beyond us, the entire dining hall had transformed. Everything - the walls, the floor, the ceiling, even the furniture - was now made of transparent, slightly bluish-white crystal. The stone fireplace was transparent too, the Kitlix inside now a being of pure crystal and faceted geometry, seemingly purged of its previous black and orange colors.

Clear, crystalline eyes of the magic kitten blinked at me, as if seeing me for the first time.

"Uhhhhh.... what," Cinder let out, staring at her Lazarus bracelet.

I followed her gaze.

Her Lazarus bracelet had changed too. Instead of its usual pure black hexagonal pattern, it was now transparent and whitish-silver-blue, like it was carved from a single piece of ice.

"Impressive," Io suddenly commented at us from the edge of the crystalline hall. "Very crystal palace."

"Hey, dawg. Does this count as a disaster?" I asked.

"I'm gonna go with... yes," he nodded, antennae twitching left and right.

Vespera jumped off me, spinning like a wild squirrel, eyes wide.

"How far are things crystalline?" She demanded.

"All the way into the deep," Katherine’s figure flickered into existence, diving out from the deep shadows. "Whatever you idiots did is bad. Very bad. Never seen anything like it bad."

"What about physical distance-wise?" Vespera asked Io.

"Gloomy horse is no longer gloomy," Io said. "Almost the entire silica column along with the old citadel is now pure crystal. We should rename it to the Crystal Horse," he suggested. "Would be more accurate now."

"What the shit?" Cinder asked, poking her Lazarus bracelet with a talon.

"What in the actual Abyss did you three knobs DO?!" Katherine demanded. "Can I not leave you alone for five minutes without you breaking everything?!"

"We… did a bit of running," I said. "Then, Vee soul-claimed me. We... uhmmm... Burned the lighter for I don't know how long. It went up to about 17k mana. Saw the thing from the lake. I made a wish so the Outsider wouldn't come through reality to our lovely Guild citadel. Now we have a crystal building. Hooray?"

"Outsider... what Outsider?!" Kat frowned.

"Long story," I said. "Involves Ci. She can tell you about it if she wants to."

Cinder frowned, clearly not wanting to talk about her problems with Kat.

I leaned close to the now crystalline floor. I could see right through it to the caverns below. Bewildered faces of my mooks stared up at me through layers and layers of crystalline walls. I waved at them.

I focused past the tunnel-expanding mooks, past the myriads of caverns and crystalline tunnels. Something glowed far, far below us looking like distant ocean waves moving in radial patterns.

I realized what I was looking at.

“Holy crap,” I commented. “I can see all the way down to Abystall Dungeon, this is freaking amazing!”

My friends stared down into the floor with me, their expressions extra-bewildered.

Then I considered what else I was seeing. The tunnels below us should have been pitch black and yet they weren't. It was like the crystal strata glowed ever so slightly from within, creating incredibly even, soft light, basically casting the glow of Abystall fields through itself like a gargantuan prism.

"Wowzah. Sheeeeet," Vespera clicked, tapping the crystalline floor with her talons. "It's... conducting electricity. Conducting magic. Like, really well. Better than magisteel."

She pressed her magisteel-covered hand against the floor, sending sparks dancing across it. The electricity spread out in perfect fractal patterns, creating intricate designs that pulsed with inner light.

"Wow," she breathed. "This crystalline strata is... perfect. No impurities, no flaws. It's like... like someone took reality and... optimized it."

"Optimized it how?" I smiled at her.

"Uhhhh. Made it... more Syntropic," she clicked.

"Umm, guys," Cinder commented. "Did we break our Lazarus bracelets? Why are our bracelets transparent?"

"The bracelets aren't broken," Vespera clicked thoughtfully, sending more electrical currents into her transparent hexagonal bracelet. "The hexagrams are still there, it's just... the strata materia is overwritten conceptually. Just like cavern silica. Everything is basically… Syntropically stabilised."

"Am I Syntropically stabilised too?" I grinned at her. "Are my teeth and bones transparent now?"

The Thunderbird grabbed me, sending sparks across my body.

"Nope," she said. "You're still a basic human bean. Whatever this is, it didn't apply to organic materia.”

"Lame," I whined. "I wanted to be Crystal-man. Should have wished for infinite wishes."

“This is better,” Vee clicked. “It has the potential for writing an ungodly amount of hexagrams on it! Saves me a fuck-ton of time."

"And now everyone in Undertown will know where we are," Katherine growled, stalking across the crystalline floor. Her claws made soft clicking sounds against the transparent surface. "The giant crystal tower is a bit of a giveaway. Plus it's basically transparent. No privacy whatsoever. Now is anyone gonna go to the bathroom here? Look, you can see everything and everyone through it!”

“A temporary problem,” Vee waved at Kat. “I can add privacy hexagrams where such are needed that should make specific sections take on solid colors.”

"As for any potential crystal palace invaders. They'll have to swim through a moat of mites to get to us," I said.

"A moat?" Katherine asked.

"I sent a few of my most agile mooks into Abystall fields to collect more mites to refill the extradimensional bags," I said. "I'm exporting Duskbloom and Duskbloom accessories."

"You're... exporting Duskbloom?" Katherine's eyes widened. "To freaking where?"

"Wherever it is needed most," I shrugged.

The Stollwurm's eye twitched.

"Are you..." Katherine's tail lashed dangerously. "Are you planning to spread Duskbloom to other cities on Arx?"

"Only if they attack Kathopolis," I said, picking up the now transparent Kitlix from the fireplace and sitting in a leather chair like a proper supervillain. "Maybe I'll hold Arx hostage for 100 billion celesteel cards or something? Anyways for now it's mostly a deterrent, sort of like having nuclear armament!”

The Stollwurm didn't seem too pleased by my words. I ignored her.

“Hey, Vee, does the crystal tower attract the mites?" I asked our resident Thunderbird.

Vespera sent more electrical currents across the crystalline floor, studying the patterns.

"No," she clicked thoughtfully. "It's pure conductive strata. Doesn’t have shit flowing through it with the exception of hexagrams already there. Good for writing... runes on. Das about it."

“How good?”

“Possibly the best strata I've bloody seen,” she replied. “Has a ridiculous level of artificer malleability. Around 17k on the aetheric potential density scale.”

"Syntropic and way over nine thousand" I mused, petting the crystalline Kitlix in my lap. It purred geometrically, fractal patterns of light dancing across its transparent form. "Like Zee Captain. I think that's what she called herself... A being of Syntropy. Hrm. Vee, can you try writing a cold rune through a wall, onto the other side of the floor below us?"

"Mhmm," Vespera hummed, her magisteel talons igniting with electrical arcs. She pressed them against the crystalline floor, sending currents of electricity dancing through the transparent material.

The electricity formed intricate patterns that seemed to sink deeper and deeper into the crystal, each layer perfectly aligned with the ones above and below it. The patterns spread out in three dimensions, creating a complex lattice of glowing lines.

"Oh wow," she clicked excitedly. "Yep. I totally can! The crystal conducts and holds the patterns perfectly! It's like... like writing on water, except the water remembers everything and amplifies it! Yeah, this is hell-a-handy. I can write runes on the other side of walls, you're right!"

"Then I got a job for you," I said. "Write generic mana pulse runes around the tower to attract mites. I want the outside crawling with them. So much so if anyone even looks at it, they will want to run away screaming."

"I can do better than that," Vespera clicked, her gray eyes sparkling with joy of artificery. "Cus the entire silica column is basically single strata, I can write a massive resonance pattern that will make the mites swarm in specific formations. Like... imagine a giant skull made of glowing parasites floating above our tower! Ke ke ke."

"Perfect!" I grinned. "Make it happen."

"On it!" Vee gave me a salute.

Katherine stared from me to Vespera.

"What?" I asked her. "The mites are attracted to magic. Vee can direct magical pulses in a specific direction from our tower. It's basically a magic beacon with point and click. Imagine a magical ray that raises the or lowers the aetheric density of a specific location."

"A deathray," Vee clicked merrily, sending sparks flying across the floor as she clapped her talons together. "I love the way you think, Quartermaster! We are going to need a power source for this thing though. Something incredibly magical.”

“Maybe I can steal the Abystall core?” I asked.

“Sounds like an extra-dangerous idea, but yeah,” Vee clicked. “A dungeon core would work. Or at least a very big beast core. Without that, the tower is a car without fuel. Can only cast smol, basic spells. Nothing guided or far away."

"Should we kill these two now or later?" Kat asked Cinder.

"Uhhh." The Quetzi tapped her pearlescent chin. "Maybe later. After they're done being useful."

"I heard that!" I called out. "No plotting my demise!"

"Too late," Katherine growled. "I'm already plotting."

"Same," Cinder nodded.

"Aww, they're bonding over wanting to murder us," Vespera clicked cheerfully. "Isn't that adorable?"

"Adorable?" Katherine's emerald eyes narrowed dangerously. "You think this is cute? I’m being serious! You two are clearly insane and need to be put down for your own good.”

"Shhh. Everything's cute when you're in love!" Vespera sang, smooshing me.

"Love?" Katherine repeated. "You've known him for what, a week?"

"And what wonderful week it's been!" Vespera clicked. “What's not to love?”

“He literally threw Duskborn mites at your face,” the Stollwurm pointed out. “I saw it before I peaced out."

"Ah, mais oui!" Vespera clicked, switching to perfect French. "C'est l'amour! C'est très romantique! Such passion, such vision! And now he gives me a crystalline palace to conduct electricity through! Mon petit renard est parfait!"

"I don't speak French," Katherine growled. “I’ve no idea what you’re saying.”

"L'amour ne connaît pas de langue!" Vespera declared dramatically, draping herself over me. "Il parle avec le cœur! With actions! With biological weapons and criminal enterprises! With deadly mites to the face! With localized Celestorms overwriting our Arx domain to create a proper... oh. Oooooooohhh!"

Her beak fell open.

Kat blinked at us, not getting the entire picture.

"You made a mage tower!" Vee accused.

"Yep," I nodded. I lifted the lighter to my face, checking the level of the fluid. Half of it was already gone. Way to go me, way to use it conservatively. Eh, whatever. At least it worked. Sort of. Instead of a mere crumbling citadel tower, I now had a proper mage tower, one that could eventually cast area-wide spells, if we aquired a dungeon core to power it.

“Hang on,” Cinder drew her ocean-blue eyes from the transparent caverns below us to my smug face. “Did you… plan for this? All of us giving you our Omnid scales, feathers and fuzz ground into shakes, us chasing you across the cold tunnel and back here, Vee biting you… then all of us using the lighter to create a localized Celestorm?!”

“Ten million points to Quetzi-claw house,” I winked at her. “There is power in specific magical acts. I knew that whatever resonance exists between me and Vee could produce a Celestorm. I knew that there’s an Outsider that I had to start booting out sooner or later. Though… I didn't expect the tower to become this crystalline. That's a nice bonus. Very wizard-chic.”

"You..." Cinder's feathers shifted through brilliant oranges. "You manipulated me and Vee into... into..."

"Into helping us create a proper mage tower?" I suggested innocently. "One that can channel and amplify magic across all of Undertown? One that lets Vee write runes on crystalline strata with lightning? One that will eventually give us a proper base of operations on Arx, right beneath Shandria? Yes. Yes I did. You’re welcome."

"You absolute..." Cinder's wings flared bright. "You... you..."

"Manipulative genius?" I suggested. "Brilliant strategist? Handsome devil?"

"CHEEKY CHUPPY!" She roared, grabbing and hugging me tight.

"That too," I nodded sagely. "But I'm your chappie now. Both of yours. No take-backsies."

"There will be many take-backsies," Katherine growled. "Starting with your spine."

"Can't take my spine," I said. "I need it for my evil overlord posture. Besides, how else will I sit dramatically in my crystal throne while petting my geometric cat?"

“You don’t have a…” Cinder began.

I pointed at the stone couch turned into transparent crystal now inhabited by Io who was snacking on superhero-themed pocky sticks. “Crystal couch-throne. Fits all of my besties.”

I pointed at the crystalline tunnels and the distant view of Abystall Dungeon far beneath our feet.

“Crystalline-prison,” I grinned. “Fits all of our future Emeralds.”

Cinder choked.

“And below that… our lovely dungeon human settlement, for our future human colony.”

“Where dungeon Sentinels and giant tentacle monsters roam wild and free,” Cinder let out.

“Indeed,” I said. “I was quite frankly concerned about the number of mage-staff and arrow-armed Sentinels down there but now that we have a mage tower pointed down there… well then…"

"We could death-ray the monsters directly from above... to clear some room," Vespera grinned, clapping her talons together excitedly.

Cinder’s eyes went wide and then her mouth snapped shut. She slipped onto the crystalline couch-trone next to Io, rubbing her face and pulsing with the colors of a well-lit See-Mass tree.

"Does this really help... with my soul?" She asked.

"A mage tower is step one," I shrugged. "A thousand more to go."

"I see," she deflated slightly.

I resumed petting the clear Kitlix and wondered how Emerald’s team was doing uptown and whether the crumbs of incredibly dastardly information I sent up via orphans and mooks across the barricades made her life extra complicated.