Chương 15: Chapter 1-14 – A Shadow on the Horizon

Evening was drawing nearer. Not near enough to explain the darkness on the edge of the world we were flying somewhat towards, however.

"Flowing Silver Emperor has moved His Court to the edge of the invasion area, along with the other Emperors whose territories abut it," King Cloud Moon explained to me.

"From there they can command Their subjects as needed to break the constant stream of attacks coming from the Shadow, and to ward off the mightiest of the enemy's servants." He sounded both angry and uneasy.

"Understood. My apologies for being so weak currently, or I'd be able to take a more direct hand."

"That you come to aid us to victory is enough for now. If all that you spoke of is true, this will not be forgotten by all of the Beast Realm, forever." He was perfectly serious about that, and given how long the Beast Emperors could live, he wasn't lying, either. Also, I was a Novice Mage in his eyes; it was like a little mouse piping up about how she couldn't contribute more in the fight against the lions. Plucky but hardly unexpected. Well, I was going to be putting some thorns in some paws, I reckoned.

Delimited was all repped out, hadn't even taken that long. I had so many Metas I needed to pick up, Class Levels to take, and so forth... Well, I supposed I had nothing to do but spend time and Levels to get there, one day at a time.

"We should arrive at the edge of the fighting area shortly, skirmish zones where the weakest members of the invaders are constantly pressing out. Will that be sufficient for you?"

"Yes. Just hold back your Aura, we don't want you sensed by something inside so it runs out here to confront you." I flicked up the Shards I had literally cast over ten thousand of while riding on his back, working out how to add in the Force Dart and my Wrath if desired, at cost of time. That wasn't even everything I wanted to do, I just didn't have the resources yet.

Burning ice swirled around all of them, joining the Holy, Vivic, and Banefires already there, and my Stars seemed to tremble excitedly, wanting to get to work.

"I want to burn an isolated sampling of them down, and leave no witnesses, if possible. If this is all true, we definitely don't want them learning about it before I can get this into the hands of the Emperors for perpetuity."

"I shall be careful in the place I choose," he assured me with a hunter's confidence. The air rippled about us, and suddenly I was sure we were no more visible than the passing wind. I suppose I shouldn't have been worried about his ability to hunt at all, given his age and power. I smiled as the darkness on the horizon grew closer, and we began to descend.

It looked much worse in Detect Magic combined with my Mask when up close. Veins of ink and shadow and jet and ink and oil and chiaroscuro running here, there and everywhere, oozing out into the pristine landscape brimming with power, Tainting it and the Beasts who resided there, many not even realizing the Taint was there until it was too late. Definitely growing, too, by what I was seeing.

They simply had no appropriate way to fight it off, save the creatures with mastery of Light Magic directly striking at the Taint. That did nothing against the planar rupture that was emitting it continually, and which they couldn't get close to in order to strike it directly. I supposed some kind of Beast Tide might have been able to reach it, but did they actually have the power to close it?

If not, then all they would do is sacrifice powerful Beasts who took decades, centuries, or millennia to reach their heights of power, while the servants of the Darkness below just returned, spending whatever was needed to breach the rupture and walk in another world once again... Not Darkness, however. This was... Shadow... Ho... interesting... Shadow was the Neutral-leaning aspect of Darkness. That didn't mean it didn't have a whole lot of Evil associated with it.

It was the pragmatic, living sort of Darkness that didn't mind causing something a whole lot of excess pain, or exercising a perverse kind of justice, but it didn't go out of its way looking for stuff to be cruel to, only being that way when it was time to fight, with no reservations. But here, they were being aggressive. Interesting... I'd spoken with the King about the different Beast Kingdoms and Spheres of Magic here, and he'd run down what he knew of them.

There were the basic Seven Spheres/Elements, considered the foundations of all magic, the most common and most widely understood and employed by all living creatures. Then there were multiple Spheres which extended off from them, and had their own aspects to them. Dimensional Magic was made up several Spheres. The first was Summoning Magic, which dealt with forming Contracts with sapient Magical Beasts, and Summoning denizens of the Beast Plane forth to fight on the Mortal Plane.

The second was the Psychic Element, of Telepathy, Empathy, and associated disciplines, known among Humans mostly for its ability to interfere with Casting and for being able to sense and communicate with Beasts. The third was the Void or Space Element, which made me frown when he talked about the particulars of moving between dimensions, and altering gravity, using force vectors, and the like. Really, it sounded like he was mixing together multiple psionic disciplines...?

A case of content theft: this narrative is not rightfully on Amazon; if you spot it, report the violation. The fourth was the rare and powerful Sound or Thunder Element, which was difficult to defend against. King Cloud Moon wielded Air, Ice, and this powerful Element, whose power ranged from insinuating Whispers to killing Screams. The fifth Dimensional Sphere was the very rare Chaos Magic, which dealt with altering the rules of magic and reality itself, the wielders of it elusive and confusing to deal with.

Dark Magic had multiple Spheres, too. The Shadow Element was the one most common here. Often found here was the Poison Element, common among Tainted Plants and Beasts, as it seemed to draw Dark Mana to it among the Beasts who had naturally poisonous attacks. The soul-attacking Curse Element was wielded by some of the powerful invaders, and the Undead Element, which brought forth numbers of powerful dead souls, mostly former Humans in rotting shells, appeared sometimes as well.

These were counter-balanced by the White Magic Spheres of Plant, which did exactly what it sounded like; Healing, also fairly standard and its scarce wielders treated reverently; and the Blessing Element, which was extremely rare and its wielding species all extraordinary and acclaimed in the Beast Realm. Interesting that the Light Element was considered a founding Element, but Shadow was not.

King Cloud Moon said that the Dark Magic extended from the Dark Planes, and was not natural to the world, having been introduced to the mortal world and was now here by the intervention of the Dark Lords, a way to extend their influence into other worlds. Supposedly there was a Blood Element, but the creatures who wielded it did not dwell in the Beast Realm. All of that sounded absolutely marvelously incomplete to me. A Blood Element could be called a Flesh Element, too, from another perspective.

Why would there be a Plant Element, and not the other? Where was the Temporal Element? Did they even have one, could they mess with actual time and not just the perception of it? Acids and bases didn't seem to be reflected here. Someone needed to be brought up on their Energized chemistry... Shielding and protective magic, as well as Divination, were extremely rare, scattered among the Elements, or just plain non-existent.

Either you were tough enough to endure some magic, used your own to counter or divert it, or if you were mortal, you had some artificial defenses against it, like magical Shields or Armor of various types. Beasts didn't make magical Tools like that, so Cloud Moon was moderately disdainful of them, even though he knew how powerful they could help make Humans. Well, he was fifty feet tall and his feathers were extremely effective armor. It was no surprise.

I could see the threads of Shadow influence creeping into the forest valley he picked, gliding down onto one of the larger trees and alighting on one of the branches as if he didn't weigh multiple tons, a position where he could look over the valley and the Creatures within it, sending out subtle winds as he wished to aid them... or protect me, as it were. I just hopped off him, Hands of the Angels catching me before I hit the ground.

Detect Shadow ranged out ahead from me, a boost of mage Mana instantly tripling the range and area of coverage. Without further ado, I closed in on the nearest creature of Shadow slinking through the undergrowth. With my Mask up and powered, I had effective Devasight and Devilsight. Natural darkness evaporated, which made the unnatural darkness of the Shadow creatures stand out like inkblots on white paper. If they were in cover, the Detect covered me as I closed in on them, and I could locate them faster.

The first one looked like a caricature of a Humanoid, with a permanent leering grin, long hooked nose and chin, ragged clothing made of trailing shadows, and a sickle in its hand, ready to reap any unfortunate living things he found. The subtle trail of Shadow Magic behind it was spreading Taint, slow but sure, but would dissipate naturally unless it was reinforced.

I slammed a no-miss flight of Shards into it, silvery wedges swirling with six different blazing fires of magic as they plowed into it, and somewhat to my surprise, quite literally blew it apart instantly. Dark pieces of its body blazed with vivus as they hit the ground, and the flames latched onto its spirit as they did so. There was a faint cry of surprise, a whoosh as its ephemeral spirit was consumed and Fed to the Land, and then all that was left was bits and pieces of its unnatural body going away mistily.

I was duly impressed as I trotted in closer, surveying the circle of white that was now spreading rapidly, the mists even wafting along its backtrail gently, sparkling as they did so. Something glittered in the middle of the circle. I reached out with Minor TK and drew it to me. Another one of those crystals, smaller than the Bat's. I picked it up and held it before my eyes, Detect Magic looking it over closely, and my Stars seemed to shiver in anticipation. Hmm...

I pressed it to my forehead, reached out with my Stars, and they ate it. Some vestige of spiritual energy was drawn out of the crystal in a vivic swirl, and the Wind Star chimed happily in its dance as the energy reinforced its shell to another Tier. Wrath instantly began accumulating another round of Mana inside it, building another seven points into it in less than a minute as it restored everything I was Casting. So...

vivus condenses their spiritual energy into these crystals, which can be used to reinforce Stars?, I hazarded, a slight smile spreading across my face. The foundation of the Shells indicated how much Mana I could draw out of the Stars at any one time. At this time, that was a maximum of three points after three refinements of their shells.

Each increase of a point represented almost a squaring of the basic amount of energy involved, although it was dispersed between range, quality, duration, area of effect, and power of effect. The basic Air effect of Wind Trails was a single stream of wind, and as Caster Level improved, the duration, power, and length of it improved. With two Tiers of power, I could make up to four Trails, and they were stronger and stayed in place longer.

If I used all three Tiers of power, I had gone up to nine Trails, they were much faster, and I could adjust and move them on the fly, enabling rapid shifts of direction and vastly improved evasive ability. All with only spending one Mana point. The stronger Stars upped the resonance and meant more magic came, without increasing the cost of the spell! So cheaty, so broken. I Cast Run, and fed Run a Mana point, too. The basic effect of Run was +10 to movement speed for an hour per Caster Level.

A Caster could trash it for a +30 'sprint' boost to speed for one minute per hour of remaining duration. The Mana surging through the spell promptly boosted it, thrumming in my muscles and veins with additional power, sort of like a higher-end lightfoot effect, or a Speed boost. My Assay said the boost was now +30, +90 if I trashed it.

With the base Warlock, Mage, Cold, and Good boosts applied, I was sitting at eight hours of very enhanced movement which, if not high-end lightfoot, would be just as good as soon as I used Wind Trails. My only problem now was that I didn't have a lot of experience at using the Magery-type magic here, so I could literally go too fast for myself. I was now running at 75', which was close to 35 mph, incredibly fast for a Human, but the spell at least came with the reflexes to be able to keep up with my speed somewhat.