Ar'Kendrithyst

Chapter 278, 1/2

Commence final doubling, Erick said, in the control room of the [Seeds of Atunir] spellwork.

The large, white sphere of the [Spellsurge Weave] glowed brilliantly as the golden dots all around it twinkled and shimmered. Not a single one flickered Red, so Erick was able to stay here, on Veird, for the completion of this new layer of a new entrapment against Nothanganathor. The trap of Fenrir had been subverted, but this one would work because they finally had a good enough understanding about the real threats and the real scope of this war, allowing them to actually fight the war how it needed to be fought. Also, Erick was here, overcoming every shitty, major thing that Nothanganathor could throw against Plan Surround and Consume.

Tenebrae and Riivo stood at the controls hooked up to the Weaver map. Some priests and paladins of Atunir stood in prayer at the candles and the altars and incense. Screens and numbers floated on the wall. The numbers counted down.

A chime rang through the entire Northern Spellsurge Mountains.

In other rooms, and even nearby, priests started really getting into their sermons. 15 different babies were born with the help of midwives. Candles glowed with dots of orange flame that suddenly turned brilliant gold. Smoke wafting in the air curled with the scents of apples and good dirt. 2 more women gave birth with just the help of their lovers. Choirs held their notes, and songs echoed upon each other, words of prayer and hope solidifying the intention of what was to come. Golden auroras curled all around the mountains.

The sky far above the Spellsurge Mountains held the first moon that had come about from [Seeds of Atunir]. That moon was just as much a planet as Veird was a planet, though. It supported oceans and continents and it even had multiple layers of Surface, with towers of eternal stonewood linking one land to the other, and brilliant lights of [Kaleidoscopic Radiance] making the whole thing just as bright as any sun. It needed to be bright, after all. The outer surface of Fenrir would have had no light otherwise.

Over a million such moonlights existed, surrounding Fenrir at equal distance to each other. They were not full coverage. They were 65% coverage.

The original Red [Sunlights] in the sky of Fenrir were already gone, eaten by the [Seeds of Atunir] in the last doubling.

Tenebrae hovered a hand above a big blue button. A READY sign glowed above the button. His voice layered among the prayer, Commencing in 3, 2

His voice trailed away.

Erick waited for other Ericks to appear, to tell them this was a bad idea. Tenebrae waited for the same.

No one else appeared.

Erick nodded to Tenebrae.

Tenebrae slammed the [Duplicate] button.

All the moonlights corralling Fenrir copied themselves, each one splitting off from itself and casting itself into a different position around the dyson sphere, doubling the light upon that patchwork world where people died and the Red thrived. Erick watched it happen from future selves out there, and from in here. In this space, this smaller representation, golden dots floated around the white weaver map, and just like what was happening outside, those dots doubled. Those dots moved faster than physics should have allowed. Within moments the new lights took their places around Fenrir. The grid solidified.

Power thrummed.

And that was full coverage. That was it

Ah.

And then came a problem.

Every single golden dot surrounding the white sphere map suddenly flickered deeper gold, a realer sort of gold. The entire map turned solid, drops of metal hanging in the air around a lightform sphere that was no longer white and no longer light, but fully Red, and as solid as glass.

Erick did not have time to frown, but his lips were certainly moving in that direction.

And then he gave himself all the time he could ever need, stepping outside of time.

Many things happened all at once, but for Erick it took several hours.

For starters, the Weaver map wasnt telling him anything at all. So he looked outside. The silver Spellsurge Mountains were still the same, with golden wheat growing here and there and people praying in the fields, staring at the sky. Erick looked up, along with all the people.

The first planetoid was like a ball of white light, but upon closer inspection it was a whole bunch of white towers and brightly-lit land and waters. It was also starting to Red at the edges. Specifically, along the right edges, or rather, eastward, if one were to call it that, and Erick was calling it that, so thats what it was. It was as though someone was sticking Red needles into the eastern side of every part of the planet up there. Erick guessed that the attack was only 1% of the way through the planet, but even 1% was enough to really do some damage.

Erick cast his gaze further, and saw the same problem playing out on every tenth planet out there. He allowed a single moment to pass in real time, watching as more Red limned the eastern edges of 1 out of every 3 planets. Erick guessed the remaining planets were close to falling to the same whatever that this was.

Erick didnt allow another moment to pass.

That single extra moment allowed him to see more of the effect upon the first planet, overhead, and that was enough to let him know what was happening, somewhat.

The problem had started as a Redding of the eastern edges, but it had rapidly proceeded into a Red-drilling, like someone was pelting the planet with an endless, impossibly large wash of disintegrating Red raindrops

Ah. Erick said, This is the Whirlpool.

Erick had Named the attack, and the true nature of the attack appeared to him.

Silent and suddenly there, all of the space outside of Fenrirs Scheme had become a torrential spinning wash of particulates, like a storm of [Erasure Bolt]s. That Whirlpool, like a corona of death, discharged from the Scheme and washed from east to west, almost like an uncountable ocean of fish.

Fish, eh? More fish, too. Nothanganathors time out fish chomp had been his opening move against Erick and it had sent Erick many decades and Layers away. And here now there were more fish. Erick wondered if Nothanganathor had leaned into that because he was a leviathan, or because he had been close to Margleknot who was also Yggdrasil who loved fish. Or maybe he just liked fish? Erick loved scarlet king, himself. Great eating, that one.

It was a topic for another day.

Focusing on the attack, Erick knew this was not a simple attack that could be mitigated through his work alone. They had prepared for this.

Erick Stepped over to Solomon, who was frozen in time in his Black Castle, standing around in a room full of tools to prevent whatever might come. He was in his normal body, a hand half extended toward the tool that he had probably recognized that they needed long before Erick had realized the same. It was the Ocean Calmer, the thing Solomon had taken from the Black Gate to use against a theoretical Whirlpool.

Solomon had good instincts, but he couldnt really use them right now.

Solomon was not actually frozen in time. It was more like Erick had stepped outside of time. Erick thought about bringing Solomon to this perspective for a moment. Solomon probably couldnt handle this perspective for very long, but he was a True Wizard so assumptions were best left elsewhere. Erick couldnt actually bring Solomon into this frame of sight without actively working against Solomons power, though, and Solomon had a lot of power.

So Erick asked him, Hey. Want to join my perspective for a minute?

Slowly, surely, Solomon flickered gold and silver, and then his eyes began to move. Slowly, he looked at Erick. Slowly, he began to speed up.

He was using [Haste] magic to speed himself up, though. He wasnt simply outside of time. Hed probably try that trick soon enough, but there was no need for him to go wasting willpower like that right now.

Erick held out a hand toward Solomons hand, Want a boost?

Solomon started to say, Yes, but he only got out, Yeeeeeeee.

It was more of a high-pitched whine that wasnt even really there, because it had needed to move through the air to get to Erick and it wasnt moving fast enough to do that.

Erick took Solomons hand.

Solomon jerked, his body briefly twisting hard and almost rocketing away, but he moved fast enough to cancel his own [Haste] buffs, and then he was there with Erick.

I need the Ocean Calmer, Erick said, as Solomon was regaining himself. And I think this attack is actually coming at us from a side slice of this Layer 789.

Then you need the Piercer, too. The Piercer was made to break into hostile gate spaces and personal demiplanes, so I dont know how well its going to work here, but it should work, or you can make it work. Solomon gestured to a hallway. Take a Peaceful Garden, too. It was one of the things we got from Margleknot. It might help make things play nice. We have five of those. Do you want to save the Whirlpool? I wasnt able to take one from the Dark.

Nah. Im fine with destroying something that can do that much damage.

Solomon said, Sure. I have to let go, now. Its straining.

A brief little talk, both of them knowing what they needed to do. It was nice.

Erick let go, and Solomon looked like he was halfway to saying something else about how much it was hurting him, but there was no need. Blood and broken crystal were collecting around his face and mouth and vocal chords, and even on his hands and neck; every part that he had moved in order to speak with Erick in Ericks time apart from time. Hed probably cough up blood when his time came about...

He would be fine.

If Solomon wasnt a True Wizard then Erick could have very easily imposed his time upon him, but Solomon was mostly immune to that sort of outside interference.

Erick went and collected the Ocean Calmer and the Piercer. The Calmer was a simple white sphere about a meter across, while the Piercer was a wicked knife made of some black material. The Peaceful Garden, in the room down the hallway and to the right, was one of several bonsai-like things, made with tiny trees that were actually full grown trees but cultivated small, and a bunch of moss and tiny crystals. Gardens were one of the main exports from the Garden Universe, and Erick had picked up several while in Margleknot, because they calmed spellwork down, and that seemed like a good idea to have at the time.

When he was done with his shopping trip, Erick Stepped back to the Spellsurge Mountains.

Things had changed.

Rozeta and Atunir were there, waiting for him, along with Phagar and Melemizargo. Koyabez, Sininindi, Sumtir, and Aloethag, were also present, for the room was still the same room that Erick had left, but it was like the walls and people and tech were all tucked away into the background, and here, surrounding the map, was the truest reality imaginable. A few other gods stuck out in the background, from Fangorl of the Wilds, to even Demon King Dinnamoth.

Erick tilted his head a little, to look upon the normal space. The gods vanished and there were the time-frozen people kneeling in prayer and Tenebrae on the cusp of freaking out at the new Redness of the Weaver.

Erick tilted his head back and looked upon the gods. So weve got this Ocean Calmer, a Piercer, and a Peaceful Garden. Anyone got a preference?

Sininindi said, Ocean Calmer. Rozeta added, And me. Aloethag said, Also me.

The big white sphere went to the goddesses.

Koyabez said, Peaceful Garden. Atunir added, Me, too. Fangorl just nodded. Surprisingly, Demon King Dinnamoth joined that option, too, saying, And me.

They all got the bonsai garden.

Phagar said to Erick, Ill be with the Garden, too. Everyone not directed anywhere else will be with the Garden.

Good to know. Erick looked to the remaining three. Melemizargo, Sumtir, and Zephyrspray. Piercer?

Melemizargo said, Realm Piercer.

Oh? Not just Piercer? Erick floated the black dagger to them and Melemizargo did not elaborate.

The knife held in the air between the impossibly large dragon, the warrior of righteousness, and the always-moving goddess of travel.

Things changed just outside of sight, on the other side of vision.

Erick couldnt see it but he could feel it, so he tilted his head a little bit to see them better.

The room turned into a massive grand cathedral filled with way too many people and way too many hopes and prayers. All the gods were their true selves beyond that little change in perspective. From Rozetas endless white body in the clouds to Sininindis crashing ocean and eternal adamantium/lightning storm, to the ocean of blood that was Aloethags Red Dream.

Erick gazed upon that Red Dream for a moment. He saw orcols and life-after-death and life-in-the-Dream. It had been a long time since he had participated in that part of life, here on Veird, when he had shared a weird night in his mind with Mog and Al. Mog was gone now; Erased. Al was a Shade these days. Based on the Red nature of Malevolence, a lot of orcols were looking into renaming the Red Dream, but the name was the name, and it was stuck for now.

Erick righted himself and he stood in the single room-outside-of-time. Is that everyone Ah! Good. Hello.

Shadow and Fairy Moon stepped into the room. An entourage followed behind them, from Queen Gregarious to Gnowmi to Enchanters Guile, the golden metallic fox padding along on a Path of Springtime, like all the others.

Fairy Moon and all the fae with flowers in their hair or dirt on their skin, stepped over to the Peaceful Garden with Rozeta and Atunir and most of the gods, all of them intoning together, Here we Stand, on solid Ground.

Gregarious and the water and metal fae went to the Ocean Calmer with Sininindi, their words like a singular echo, Here we Rise, with washing Tide.

Shadow and the final rest of the fae stepped toward Melemizargo and the Realm Piercer knife, intoning, Here we Cut, with rugged Knife.

Erick remained where he was, at the control of the system. The [Spellsurge Weave] was an orb of red glass ribbons becoming a spiraling, expanding, Erasing presence, surrounded by tiny gold dots that were about to give way to the flood. Erick wouldnt let that happen.

2,097,152 and 1 planets vibrated.

Erick spoke with thunderous power, Here we Crush, Script over Scheme.

The encirclement gonged.

- - - -

A child ran under the light of the sun across a break in the ground, leaping from desert to grasslands, and then running faster. The demons were coming, and they werent like grandma and grandpa. They were the Old Demons, and the child had been running for days. He had been living in the settlements outside of Stratagold and now he was up here, on the Surface, except it wasnt the Surface at all.

Behind him, the many-legged clawer stabbed across the ground, pulled itself across the land. Its face was the face of the childs mother, calling out, Dont run away so fast! Mommy cant catch you if you run that fast!

Then came the laughter.

The child tried not to cry

The sky vibrated.

The Old Demon stopped chasing but the kid did not stop running.

And then the kid saw the sky ahead, where mountains topped the endless horizon. A gently-curving line of moons lay across the sky, and some sort of red rose from the sky, rising upward into the moons. The red had not been there before, and now it was there.

Everything turned Red.

Just as fast, the moons vibrated, sending out what could only be a [Holy Wave] of power from each and every one of them.

That wave crashed into the Red.

The ground heaved, and the child was in the air.

The sky came down, and then there was no breath. No down. No up.

The sun/moons in the sky went bright.

The world broke.

The child began to pass out from the trauma of it all, from the cold and the pressure that was not pressure at all, and from the rocks cast from the ground like [Rock Bolt]s, but in that moment, White Sparks drifted across the world, scouring the Old Demon from existence and then moving on.

Hours later, the child woke in a field of pristine grass and a blue box he had missed so very much appeared to him.

You were taken from us.

We came to get you back.

A childs assistance : Casting [Greater Treat Wounds].

You are at 1 HP. You have stabilized.

A childs assistance :

A case of theft: this story is not rightfully on Amazon; if you spot it, report the violation.

The child cried for so many different reasons.

- -

A man with one arm remaining held off the horde of ballooning spiders with his broken greatsword, slicing through the torso-sized monsters like a rookie, here in the final room of their estate. He was ashamed. He was terrified. He did what he could. What remained of his family huddled behind him, his son bleeding out, his daughter dying of poison, his wife already gone. He should have been better at killing these beasts, but was not. The Script had abandoned them all.

The gods had even joined in the slaughter of the people last week, Red sparking from all of their bodies. The man would never forget the sight of Rozeta eating the entire capital in one bite and then breaking the mountains apart with one casual flick of her continental-sized tail

A spider got to his leg and began pumping him full of venom. He hacked at it, killing it, but he knew. He knew the end was here. One bite was all it took

The world shook. Everything broke.

White Sparks flooded the land and remade as much of what it could, while taking the spiders away.

A blue box appeared and the man almost swiped it away, cursing Rozetas name. But then he read the box.

You were taken from us.

We came to get you back.

Minimal assistance available at this time.

Here is a Personal Script to assist you with doing what you already know how to do:

Accept / Deny

The man wasnt sure what to do

I accept! said the son, and then the son started healing the sister.

The father almost blacked out, but then the son was there with a [Cleanse] and a [Heal] and the fathers eyesight cleared again, just in time to see a new blue box... Except it wasnt a blue box at all. Words floated in front of him, in front of just his eyes, and he could already tell his son didnt see them.

Quest Offered: Transformation of [Rejuvenation] into [Greater Regeneration].

Cost: Kill 25 spiders.

Accept / Deny

The father almost asked what the words meant

But the reprieve from the spiders had just been that, a reprieve, and now they poured back into the strangely-immaculate manor, breaking windows that had been broken long before now, and yet here they were, getting broken again. He said Yes to the floating text and he picked his sword back up.

The man still only had one arm, but power flowed through him as his [Rejuvenation] was active, somehow, and working overtime.

Somewhere between killing the 25th spider and the 26th, something changed inside of him and more text appeared.

Quest Complete!

[Greater Regeneration] achieved!

Power flowed through his body and the mans missing arm began to regrow.

His son touched his back and healed him faster.

His daughter twisted flames into the spiders, and the spiders burned, the fire spreading to catch them and only them on fire.

Whispering, the daughter said, Rozeta came back, dad. Shes back.

- -

A dragonkin woman on the high seas pulled on the line, holding the boom of the mainsail in place, yelling something incoherent and furious into the storm all around. Her eyes were full of rage. Her sister and brother in the boat, holding onto the wheel and holding onto the railing, roared with her. They sailed on in defiance of their death, rushing through the waters behind them.

The monster rose from the depths again, cackling as it roared out red lightning. Sininindi calls! it mocked. Give up and join your people in my belly!

Never! roared the woman at the main mast, holding the main sail in position to catch the wind of the storm. She knew it was futile to run, but she had to run. Storms Edge had been turned into Red horrors, and she and her family were the only ones who had seen it. Ill never!

The world thrummed.

The storm parted under a great wash of white light, shimmering from above the clouds, piercing through the sky like knives. The waters rose from the ocean with a great thrum of white light. The red leviathan evaporated under the onslaught from above

A real blue box appeared.

The woman didnt know how she knew it was real, but this one was real.

You were taken from us.

We came to get you back.

Minimal assistance available at this time.

Here is a Personal Script to assist you with doing what you already know how to do:

Accept / Deny

Accept! roared the woman, and her siblings.

The leviathan was gone, but the ocean was still in the air, and suddenly the ocean crashed down. The woman got a mana pool back, but none of her usual mana. The next two minutes were the craziest of her life, but she had been through many storms before, and this one was breaking. The air crackled with golden lightning and the woman felt Sininindi in the air. The real one. She laughed at the circumstance. What was a natural storm but a test of the gods, and this was a test she could handle!

The ocean churned and things died in the depths and a few points of mana came to her over a hazardous minute. That was all she really needed to [Mend Ship] and prevent her boat from breaking. Her brother calmed the water and her sister calmed the air, and that was enough to weather the worst of it.

Ten minutes later, they were sailing with mended sails under a clear sky stacked with moons.

They stared upward.

Its just one right on top of the other, higher and higher? asked the brother.

Yeah. Thats exactly what it was.

Except, the woman noticed something. They form a line. Theyre stacked, but they form lines, and She looked at the horizon. There, shining like a city on a distant hill, was another moon. It could have been an illusion created by the vast, flat distances of this strange new world that was not Veird at all, but the woman didnt think that was the case at all. That one aint in the sky. Its in the ocean.

The brother instantly said, Lets go to it before the leviathans come back.

Im right there with you, brother, said the woman.

The wind picked up at their backs, and all three of them startled. The sister startled the most of all.

The woman looked to the sister. Did you pray again?

It was an accident! the sister exclaimed. Im sorry!

It was weird for the woman to chide her sister over praying to Sininindi, but The last week had been horrific and wrong. The woman recognized that. The sister recognized it, too, and she dared to believe.

The brother said what they were all thinking, It seems that we are truly in the hands of the real goddess again.

The wind picked up stronger.

Even the waves crested in the direction of the sun resting upon the surface of the world. The woman took up no argument against the validity of this Sininindi, whoever she was.

She just grabbed the lines and the ship came together a little bit more. Her magic was working like it should have once again, though she only had bare trickles of mana flowing how it should. 10 mana here. 20 mana there in the next minute. This Personal Script was all sorts of different and she didnt trust it, but it was what she needed right now. What they all needed.

The siblings moved silently, working as a team, the brother on the wheel, the sister at the sails, and the woman at keeping the ship itself together, as they always had before.

Something like hope kindled in their hearts as they sailed toward the sun, sitting in the ocean.

- - - -

The anti-Whirlpool ritual had gone off without a hitch, and then everything became a hitch. Not in the way Erick had expected, though.

Erick had been watching Fenrir for a while at this point. For everyone else, the last three days had been 3 days. For Erick, it had been 29 days, or something like that. Or maybe 229. He knew the exact time, but he tried not to think in those sorts of ways.

Erick had been watching Fenrir.

He knew where to strike to eradicate their built up forces. He also knew that most of the people down there were not evil at all, nor were they believers in the Red. But some people were. During the encirclement, three days had passed for both Veird and Fenrir, and certain parts of Fenrir had moved somewhat in order to do whatever they wanted to do to fight back against the coming encirclement.

Then the encirclement had finished, and Nothanganathor had struck back with some sort of semi-tamed Whirlpool. He had initiated his attack not from the Godpact world, but from a part of the multiverse of Layer 789 that contained no Veird at all. Nothanganathor had done some Wizardry with some artifacts of some sort, no doubt, so the effects of the Whirlpool had been targeted to this God Pact slice of Layer 789. The actual Whirlpool had been over here, where Erick now floated.

Erick hadnt spent any time at all on the other slices of this multiversal battle because chasing someone through infinity was a fools errand in too many ways to count. From the fact that Erick was focused on the godpact world, to the fact that infinity was infinity Erick had left the multiverse alone.

Nothanaganthor had unleashed the Whirlpool from the multiverse.

In this space, a good hundred-Fenrir-wide swaths of reality had been subsumed into a washing, crashing, spilling maelstrom of ripping and tearing black-white-blue. No Red; not unless you counted the red part of the spectrum of light as Red, and Erick certainly didnt. There wasnt any more red than there was green or orange or yellow, meaning not much at all. The Whirlpool was already dying down and all the Red magics that had focused it onto the Godpact Veird were gone, because the ritual Erick had done with the gods and the fae had killed Nothanganathors controlling spellwork. This area was now a dead-end of the war. Without a mana ocean to eat and live within, the Whirlpool was the same as any evaporating black hole; it had a lifespan.

Erick floated far outside of the former-Fenrir system, as a black dragon, far away from the Godpact world, watching as the very universe itself twisted into a roil. It crashed and imploded and soon it would die. Maybe 150 years? Hard to know, and Erick didnt feel like venturing into the future to make sure of any timeline; that would give solidity to Nothanganathor winning this war.

Checking up on this end of Veirds Crushing Ritual was just checking a box off, too. One of many different boxes that Erick had checked off in the last 6 real hours, and several thousand subjective hours.

He Stepped back to the Godpact Veird, to orbit, above the Northern Spellsurge Mountains. Another Step brought him back down to the Weaver, and to the control room of Plan Surround and Consume.

The meters-wide white sphere that had been the weaver map, surrounded by gold dots, and which had been briefly attacked by the Red Whirlpool, was now a simple, solid blue sphere, like a tranquil ocean. A gnarled tree grew up from the ground and grabbed onto the blue sphere, its branches wrapped around the sphere like a woven truth. The tree itself glowed a little, brilliant white in the cracks and with tiny flaming green leaves and a rainbow sort of light around it. It was not Yggdrasil, but it was an offshoot of the big guy.

The priests and the singers and all the people who had made this thing work were gone; on to the rest of their life, into different plots and plans for Fenrir. A few different priests had moved in after the ritual.

The altars to Atunir, strewn throughout the room and around the former map, had been altered irrevocably, and so had the Spellsurge mountains. Atunir had her prayerstones here and there, of course, with cornucopias of food pouring forth in stone relief, but most of that was gone. Where once there were prayerstones only to fertility and field, there were now prayerstones to Rozeta for good magic, or prayers to Phagar for a Good End or asking him to stay away for a while longer. Peaceful Koyabez stood in relief on the wall over there, his hands holding broken swords. Righteous Sumtir held a sword aloft over there, shining bright and carving through sparks. Aloethag had her Rage. Others had other powers on display in hands, and in gestures. And then there were the stone shapes of the fae, hiding here and there on the edges of all the rest of the space. All was done in stone. None of it held color. The only color in the room was the blue sphere, gently glowing underneath the branches of the softly white and green tree that held it in the center.

The roof of this ritual space was gone.

Up above, beyond a moons distance, lay a planet that glowed like a sun.

Soft white light shone down into this space, but this space was still mostly blue in the center.

The shape of the hole in the roof and the brightness of the moon up there kinda made it all look like an eye. A bright white eye. Melemizargo didnt have an altar here, but he was still very present in the Darkness of every nook, and in overwatch, up above.

The priests of all the gods were still moving in, but Kromolok, the High Inquisitor of Rozeta, was already here.

The incani-shaped white wrought stepped into the white and blue light with Erick, grinning as he said, You look exhausted.

I am pooped.

Kromolok chuckled. Thats about the weirdest slang I have ever heard from you.

Erick stood up straight. How goes it?

It goes. Kromolok said, Plan Surround and Consume finished 6 hours ago and then this Crushing addendum worked quite well. Rozeta is handing out Personal Scripts on behalf of the entire Pantheon He glanced away, and then looked to Erick. Which means your Mark is now out to about 500 million people. Barely a fraction of a percent of a percent of the people down there. We can also see the other side of Fenrir, now. The inside. There are concerns, but youre checking off those concerns even now. He asked, So how are you feeling, Erick?

Erick sighed.

Erick was tired. He hadnt lied about that.

The outcome of Plan Surround and Consume had resulted in them Crushing the magics down there, and then reordering the magics of Fenrir itself. Solomon had been involved with that, but so had all the other Relevant Entities of the Script.

6 hours in real time lasts a lot longer than 6 when you can control where you are in time.

Erick cast his Gaze to Fenrir, and then further beyond, to the sun sitting at the center.

The interior of Fenrir held more people. It was a land similar to the land on the exterior; a bunch of different lands stolen from this or that place and then strewn upon the surface like peanut butter on bread.

And the sun was just a sun.

No Nothanganathor.

No climactic battle.

Not even any Red Gods. Not really. There had been one incident out there Eh.

Nothanganathor had simply moved away from that version of Fenrir down there, and he had taken all of his toys with him. Or perhaps he had never been there at all. Erick thought the first option was more likely than the second. He had surely been there at some point in time

And yet when Nothanganathor had dragged Erick to his Wizard-kill-box, that place had been in a different slice of Layer 789 where there was no Fenrir at all, and Nothanganathor veritably filled the entire surface of that sun with his back-lit body.

Erick looked up at the sun-like moon in the sky, and then he looked back to Kromolok. I feel tired and thin. Drawn in too many directions at once, and utterly furious and happy that there wasnt any final battle right now. I also feel a great many of the people of Fenrir, calling out for help They need help. He chuckled. Kinda worrying that I can hear them like this, too. I already checked in with Yggdrasil so Im not going to get deified, or anything like that. Its probably the Benevolence Mark inside of them. All the other gods have already begun to ascend higher, though. He gestured to the room around them. I mean, look at this. Stone statues! Im sure they could take control of any of them and theyre probably watching, but The ritual went very well, and then what came afterward went better. Kinda disheartening to see them as statues instead of as people, though.

Kromolok said, Theyre still there. Same as always. But they are gods. They do want to help their people just as much as you do, and they fully accept the power those people are giving them, now that the Red is gone. Their plan to put more of themselves into their Champions worked well. Those who had no Champions at all even appointed some before they went to Fenrir Have you considered a Champion yet?

Ha! Im not a god.

The way youre going, there is no way that you dont Ascend to godhood of some sort.

Erick smiled sadly at that. Yeah. I know Or at least I suspect that outcome to be true, too. Yggdrasil is doing all he can, but for certain people who do too much Those people have to move to Margleknot full time or else they Ascend as an idea, instead of a person. Im hoping that with Yggdrasil here that we can make this place just as good for that particular need. Yggdrasil seems to think we can.

There are different options for you.

Oh sure. Lots.

Kromolok frowned a little. Im just gonna come out and say it. Erick. Have you asked Melemizargo for a Mantle? No? Why not. You could easily be a sun god. Melemizargo even has that Mantle of Light.

Asking questions and answering them yourself isnt very cool, Kromolok, Erick said, grinning. Kromolok said nothing. He stared. Erick sighed. He hasnt offered, and I have not asked.

Did you become self-destructive when I wasnt looking?

Erick huffed a laugh. Not to my knowledge.

Kromolok was not amused. A lot of events are happening all at once out there, and you helped. You did a great deal of the actual work. I see you, Erick. And I see how the people look at you. Even Im feeling a slight rush of divinity right now, but Rozeta felt that and she began to siphon it away. You might have only seen me as a coworker. But Ive been the High Inquisitor of Rozeta for 1453 years or more, depending on how you count this Long Year. I was there at the very creation of the Script, as one of the first wrought to exist. I have led Forgotten Campaigns and executed civilizations for crimes against reality. I have been on the harsh side of the light for a long while. But Ive also been a savior, as one of Rozetas strongest claws.

Rozeta killed her Red Reflection easily. Most of the other gods did the same. But the real power is coming from those who got a Personal Script. Your Benevolent Mark is giving out Quests for people to save themselves A lot of Quests.

They think Rozeta made it. Rozeta is mostly just documenting it. All she did was hand them out to people who truly needed them.

And divinity is flowing to the Pantheon and Yggdrasil has planted himself in several areas already.

Melemizargo and Rozeta and the Pantheon are experiencing the largest rise to power that any of them has ever experienced, and youre along for the ride. Kromolok asked, So? Do I have to worry about you, or are you handling it?

I appreciate your concern, and how you laid out the full breadth of your concern, but I am fine.

Kromolok held his tongue, and then he switched topics. Is this the version of you before all the stuff youve done out there, or the one after all that stuff?

Erick chuckled at that. Unfortunately, this one is just the one that did all the background work to get this whole thing functioning fine. I think I spent a year down in the depths of Fenrir, cleaning out Red infestations and other shit. I blasted a few bad actors with some [Grand Reincarnation]s. I checked out everything around all the big battles But now I have to go do those battles. He sarcastically said, It would have been nice if all of the Red Gods would have left to wherever the other ones all went. As it is I just have to help kill However many there were.

Three, Kromolok said. We only saw three god battles, mostly done through Champions. Rozeta and her Red copy. The Shades against the Shades. You only appeared at one. Oozy didnt show up at all... He eyed Erick. Should you, perhaps, go to some other Layer and take a break?

Erick waved a hand. I spent a while in a [Time Out] to recover some. Im just feeling stretched. Its taking a hot minute to calm down, and this was a good time for that calming, which is why I am here, at this moment in time.

One of the reasons he was here, anyway.

Erick Flatt, [105-ish] [Current Location: Layer 789; Veird, year 1453]

Mana split; Soul, Body, Mind: 31%, 30%, 30%

Reson allocation rate: 9%

Soul: 7.9b per day / 91,550 per second , [Mark of Benevolence Level = 7.91]

Body: 4981

Mind: 6450

Overall Stability: [+83,310, -162] Basic upkeep

Mp: 32.7t/, [+28,380, -54] Basic upkeep

Hp: 32.7t/, [+27,465, -54] Basic upkeep

Pp: 32.7t/, [+27,465, -54] Basic upkeep

Resons: 1.2t [+8,239 = +915]

Erick said, Today cost me over a quadrillion mana and 90 trillion resons, and now its time to go to battle. I mostly came here to solidify this outcome. Its a whole lot easier to make the right present happen here on Veird than it is on Fenrir; and that is why I am here, to solidify this part of Infinity. Infinity itself is splayed wide open down there and now I need to get to bringing all of that together.

Kromoloks face went hard and concerned, like he had a lot of sudden concerns, from questioning if he was in a failed universe to questioning the validity of their hard fought wins.

Erick watched him have his concerns, and he waited.

Kromolok asked, Can the gods actually handle it? Or are they changing in the new environment, too?

Erick said, Surprisingly, or maybe unsurprisingly, the fact that they all knew what was coming down the line through the worship-attack has allowed them a lot of power to resist it. They are their Mantles and themselves, after all. The Red Gods are just figments, and they were easily slaughtered from what I saw. But, speaking of battles duty calls!

Erick Stepped away.

Kromolok stayed there, standing in the blue light of the orb, held by the trees branches. Ten thousand tendrils of thought arced away from his body. He was still busy, too, even if it looked like he was doing nothing at all but contemplating the present

But there was certainly a lot of contemplation going on.