Chương 107: Chapter 183 - The Desolation

Selesia led the way, with Mirian levitating the leyline detector behind them.

"Over there was the forum," the younger woman said, pointing to a grove of trees.

"This was the temple, which was the seat of government too. Down that way were docks. Takoa and Tlaxhuaco would trade quite a bit, though I guess they would stick to the coast, then quickly island-hop to avoid sea serpents. We would trade for a bunch of things, but it was Saint Xylatarvia's gift that we valued the most. Priests would go on holy journeys to get a small piece." I wonder how Xylatarvia went from goddess to saint in their eyes, Mirian wondered.

"Xylatarvia's gift?"

"Some sort of sacred jade," Selesia said, waving her hand dismissively.

"I don't know if I really believe all the old tales. Like, there's no such thing as a talking tree. I doubt they had court birds who advised the king. Maybe some of it was true, or based on something true. Like the king had pet birds he really liked." Mirian's brow furrowed. Xipuatl's soul focus looked a lot like jade. Elder reliquaries, he called them. I still don't know why. A reliquary is a container for a holy relic, but he was insistent on the translation from Tlaxa.

Why would Tlaxhuaco have more of them than Takoa? No one seems to know how to make a focus anymore. The Luminate order said it was a lost art. So where does the material come from? There's no way everyone killed enough elder titans; titan catalysts have different properties. But how would such a critical technology be lost? Her thoughts cast back to the shrine at the end of the Frostland's Gate Vault. There had been eight statues of the Elder Gods.

The Ominian had been absent, and the eighth god had been one she'd never heard of. What does it all mean?

"…and this is where Saint Shiamagoth touched the world." There were a variety of flowers Mirian had never seen planted around a thick slab of quartzite. The stone swirled with blue and white minerals—a rare variety, she knew.

"It used to be at the top of the pyramid, and a lot bigger. When I was taking my pilgrimage here, I had to help clean it. That was when I first sensed this place was different." Selesia looked out from the top of the mound and smiled.

"It was the strangest feeling, the first time I felt it. The arcane sense, though I didn't know it at the time. I thought it was the saint's touch. In that moment, I knew I was special." She chuckled.

"Took a few years at the academy to disabuse me of that notion."

"You are special. There's memories I have of you that I know you'll never have… but I treasure them," Mirian said gently.

"I just wish you could have shared them." Selesia swallowed hard. She didn't seem to know how to respond to that. Mirian closed her eyes.

"You had a lot of innate talent if you sensed the ambient mana difference back then. It's a subtle thing." She had been right. It was there. It was like seeing little sparks dancing through a dark room. They flitted around, small and faint. When she tried to focus on them, it was like they faded from her gaze. In the Endelice, she had seen a clear pattern. She had felt the lesson the Ominian had sought to teach her. It had come to her naturally.

For three days, they stayed in the ruins of the First City while Mirian took readings and attempted to see the pattern. Then, with food dwindling, Mirian decided they should head back. She left the leyline detector to take further readings. They journeyed back towards civilization. There was still plenty of time in the cycle to make and deploy several other detectors and finish up the late-cycle readings she needed on Akana Praediar.

They headed back southeast to reach the train line, then back to Takoa. Selesia was feeling melancholy and wanted to stay with her family. She offered to collect the readings of the four detectors nearby. Mirian thanked her, and headed back along the north line to Vadriach alone. Out of habit, she grabbed several broadsheets as she was gathering new detector supplies. A few 'wanted' posters described her, though they hadn't gotten a good look at her face.

She had no problems buying tickets for a private car, then heading west. The Vadriach Line trains had clever glyph sequences that targeted certain stenches for removal. Even with them, she still could smell the freight trains when they passed by. And the freight trains were constant. The only place that would have more cargo coming in was Mercanton. Over the next few days, Mirian rode the trains up through the Western Plains.

As she traveled, she kept one leyline detector active, just so she could get a solid reading on ambient mana. The readings leveled out at a fairly normal range, but she felt something wrong. It took her some time to figure out what it was. She paused her work to meditate as they traveled. There was something in the air. It wasn't like the flickering sparks she'd felt in the ruins of the First City. Instead, it was like an absence, like something was being sucked away.

As they passed the headwaters of the Hikstoluck River, Mirian began to understand. There were fields covered, not by fallen trees, but fallen myrvites. She watched as they passed a train unloading piles of myrvite bodies. There were open-air warehouses where workers butchered them. Rows of chimeras, stacked in piles, stood next to rows of plains drakes, which stood next to piles of cockatrice—and it didn't end.

Spellcarts moved about the area, moving bodies around, which were cut apart and stacked in new piles of meat, spell organs, and detritus. The stench was unbearable. Here, she could feel it. There was some energy level between arcane and celestial that her titan catalyst helped her pick up on, and it was there that her senses could feel a sensation that she could only describe as unnerving. There was a wrongness to it. Mirian had no love of myrvites, but she could hear the Ominian's voice.

THIS PLACE, They had told her. With a shock, she suddenly recognized the area. The twisting rivers had changed it, but the nearby hills still followed a pattern she'd seen in her dreams. Instead of birds and storm raptors circling in the skies, there were clouds of insects that even the wards couldn't fully repel. Instead of herds of plains drakes and ebonfire bison, there was this desolation. She felt sick, and it had nothing to do with the smell. The Ominian didn't save Enteria only for us, she thought.

It took several more trains, each more rickety than the last, but Mirian finally made it to the far Akanan city of Frontier. It was aptly named. At least out west, the world still felt intact; there were spellwards around the cities and towns, but that meant there was still wilderness that existed to repel. She took her measurements, then began the long journey back. As she made her way back, an article from a paper she'd picked up in Vadriach caught her eye. Infiltration of the Arborholm military base?

Her heart began to pound. She was quite sure that was a new event. Someone's up there, then. After the airships, for sure. But to do what with? She studied the papers again, this time paying close attention to the details. The articles could vary quite a bit depending on how much of a stir Mirian had made, but she tried to think back to her first scouting expeditions, before she'd had an impact.

Several of these have changed, and I doubt a bit of arson and the RID hunting for a fugitive would have changed this much in broadsheets coming out of Arborholm and Ferrabridge. That led her to another question: why were there so many time travelers based in Akana Praediar? That made Troytin, Jherica, Celen, and now a mysterious fourth. It does explain why Troytin established himself in Torrviol. Perhaps it wasn't just an effort to displace me, but also to prevent rivals in Akana from being able to reach him.

Except, wouldn't that leave his operations there vulnerable to anyone remaining? How fast did he remove Jherica and Celen? And was the fourth traveler his rival, or ally? The story has been illicitly taken; should you find it on Amazon, report the infringement. She needed more information. The rest of the cycle, as she went to check her leyline detectors, she paid close attention to the papers, and a close eye on the people around her.

There appeared to be some anomalies around the assassination of Prime Minister Kinsman, but it was hard to say for sure. There were still stories running about a mysterious culprit who'd assassinated a 'paragon of the community.' Mirian couldn't help but sneer as she read the bloviating, chummy pieces about Westerun. If she hadn't known any better, she'd have thought he needed a shrine next to Shiamagoth.

It was clear that the RID was eager to hunt her down, which may have influenced who they had deployed at the assassination. Still, the other Prophet could be at work here. That played with her nerves. The rest of the world had become this harmless thing she didn't have to worry about—but other Prophets were different. They could actually hurt her. And help, she reminded herself, but the blow that Troytin had struck against her so many years ago still lingered. He had left a scar on her ability to trust.

Worse, Mirian wasn't sure if that was a boon or a curse. At the end of the cycle, she thanked Selesia. The girl looked so sad as she said goodbye. And so young.

"I don't mean to be a burden. It's just… you were this cool student I wanted to ask out, but couldn't work up the courage to talk to. And it's so strange to learn that… it happened. That we might have been together, and been happy, and it all would have worked out. But because of the loop, it never will."

"I carry all the memories with me still," Mirian said to her.

"I will remember it all. I promise." It wasn't much of a balm to the other woman, but it was what she could offer.

When she woke again in Torrviol, Mirian showed the Sword of the Fourth Prophet to the Luminate Temple just after breakfast. The first tri-point meter the Academy brought out to test her on, she overloaded. A special tri-point meter used to measure the power of archmages had to be fetched from Luspire's quarters. When she channeled a 127 myr lightning bolt, destroying the target and setting several fires, Mirian's claim of Prophet was undeniable.

"Cancel classes and direct the students to begin building defenses per this document," she said, handing Professor Cassius an annotated map.

"An army will likely be coming through Torrviol on the 28th. However, the Baracuel Army will be busy with an invasion in the south. I'll explain more later," she told Luspire.

"Schedule a meeting of all the professors of the Academy to meet on the 5th. Anyone with skill in artifice, I need your help building a spell engine. The nature of the crisis will become clear after it's built and I have presented my findings to you all." Archmage Luspire predictably bristled at this.

"Prophet or no, I am in charge of the Torrviol Academy. I will take your suggestions into consideration," he said. Mirian smiled at him. Without breaking eye contact, she called, "Nikoline Brunn!" and used lift person to drag the spy over. With her soul bindings, Specter was easy to pick out, even behind her illusions.

"What is the meaning of this?" Luspire said at the same time a shocked Specter said, "Unhand me!" Mirian embraced the titan catalyst and sheared away the soul bindings of her disguise.

"Here is your manipulator," Mirian said, as Nikoline's hair and eyes began to transform.

"I respect you too much to try to bind you with puppet strings. You'll find the real Adria in the catacombs, murdered by this traitor." She cut away the focus at Specter's ankle along with her other weapons. As she handed the focus over to a shocked Priest Krier, she called out, "Magistrate Ada! We have a spy ring to break up."

The days passed in a whirlwind. With Torres, Jei, and several other professors and artisans, they assembled a complex illusion engine. It wasn't quite the same as a Vadriach spell engine, but the difference was they'd made it in five days instead of a month, and with a team of ten instead of a team of fifty. It was limited in functionality, and the map of Enteria was a primitive two-dimensional display, but it would serve its function.

Luspire had eventually grit his teeth and allowed the meeting to proceed, though he was still going to be grumpy about it. Mirian had promised not to manipulate him, but she knew him too well. When she told him, "You know, I've met Tyrcast, and I think he's a fraud," that made the old archmage perk right up, and suddenly, he was just a little less resistant to her requests.

They met on the third level of the Bainrose Library, Mirian's spell engine projecting the leyline data, map, and ambient mana levels of three different times in sequence. Mirian gave her presentation to the group in concise, technical language as she explained the eruptions, the leyline cascade, and then the collapse.

"…I haven't gone down into Persama, but it's simple to extrapolate from what we can see here. As the leylines reform, they move away from the spot directly below the Divir Moon, and the moon falls to Enteria. What is unclear is why the resulting magical detonation is so large. Either way, nothing survives." Silence gripped the room. Professor Endresen was the first to break it.

"Well, that solves the physics mystery of Divir, doesn't it?" she said, a bit too cheerful for the room.

"Well, it doesn't explain… is there an anti-arcane force? Or is it more like magnets in how it repels the moon?"

"The Elder Gods seem to have created a material that is repelled by the leylines. The Akanans discovered some in the Labyrinth, and used it to make the airship dreadnoughts that will be attacking us on the 28th," Mirian replied.

"However, studying such a material is no guarantee that we can create more. And either way, it's the leyline collapse we need to prevent. It may be possible to use Sylvester Aurum's factories to produce leyline regulators in sufficient quantity to change the direction of a key leyline. If one leyline can be used to cause a cascade of changes in the others, it may be possible to prevent the reroute.

Though that assumes we can rapidly train dozens of arcanists on Zhighuan crystal spells and we can actually get the regulators down to the leyline, which has never been done." The room became quiet again as the circle of professors around the table contemplated the problem.

"The Divine Monument is connected," Luspire said.

"Certainly. But even with tools drawn from the Labyrinth and all the knowledge I've collected, it is an Elder device beyond anyone's comprehension. We can continue working towards a breakthrough, and should, but we also must consider the possibility that it offers no salvation." Mirian was desperately hoping she was wrong about that and the breakthrough was closer than she thought, but she didn't voice that. She wanted to see if any of the gathered arcanists had thought of something she hadn't.

Viridian was looking at Luspire. Luspire was doing his best to ignore the silver-haired man. Finally, the Archmage said, "Fine, Selkus! Say it. And Mirian, make sure the Luminates don't steal him away." Under his breath he grumbled, "The last thing I need is the Order's ire too." Selkus Viridian gave his kindly smile to the room and stood.

"In my younger days, I became curious about the question of where the waste mana in spell engines went. I believe this data confirms my hypothesis, and in fact, makes the warnings I gave at the time seem quite understated." Atger and Holvatti let out noises of exasperation, but Mirian put up her hand to silence them.

"Why would the Luminate Order take you?"

"Because I was and am a practitioner of the traditional druidic magics of Baracuel," he said simply. Mirian blinked.

"Well, you've kept that secret quite well hidden. From me, at least. This isn't the first time I've met with you. Why haven't I heard about this?" Luspire muttered, "Oh for fuck's sake." Viridian continued to smile merrily.

"You probably didn't delve too deeply into decades-old academic feuds. Suffice to say, my research caused a great deal of stir, and then a great deal of retaliation. The Luminate Order opened up an official investigation into whether or not I was practicing necromancy, while the King's Academy fired and disavowed me due to pressure from the donors. After a decade of academic exile, my good friend Medius Luspire graciously allowed me to work here as long as I promised not to speak of my research or my hobby.

A promise I've kept until now." Mirian found herself grinding her teeth. This was just like finding out that the Arcane Praetorians had known about the eruptions taking place for fifty years.

"And your hypothesis?" she snapped.

"The D-class mana from an engine becomes undetectable a few hours after its release. The common assumption is that it decomposes back into ambient mana. However, using myrvite plants that contain different classes of mana, I was able to show that mana types can bind with each other, much like the chemical bonds dear Sefora here studies, and that mana density can change.

Simply put, I believe the D-class mana output by spell engines is binding with nearby ambient mana, then descending into the Labyrinth and leylines, overloading the system. Only, I erroneously thought the problem would only manifest itself in the eruptions, not the annihilation of all life on Enteria." A chill settled over Mirian.

"I see before me a brilliantly done study that confirms my investigations in a way I never dreamed possible."

"Damnit, Selkus, we all know your study was—" Holvatti started, but Luspire shot him a withering glare and he shut up. Several other professors seemed as shaken as Mirian. Viridian continued.

"We can see clear evidence that in areas with higher spell engine usage, there's less ambient mana and higher leyline intensity. The system has reached a tipping point. The implications are obvious. Likely, its too late for my suggestions to actually solve the crisis—the tipping point has already been reached—but it's clear what must be done to prevent another crisis from occurring even if this one is solved." Mirian already knew what he was about to say.

Viridian did love his dramatic flourishes, and he had been building to this one with the care of an artist finishing up a masterpiece on his canvas. Only, the implications of his conclusion were terrifying. Civilization had a certain inertia to itself. It was like with Troytin and the Deeps—going along with their plans was easy. Getting them to stop what they were doing was nearly impossible. Here, though, she wouldn't be fighting the Department or their allies in the coup.

She would be fighting every merchant who made money on the trade and every citizen who used a spell engine for anything. They would have to tear down all the spellwards that protected people. The world would be thrown from a predictable order into unfathomable chaos. A critical discovery had been right in front of her, she just hadn't wanted it to be true.

"We must put an end to the use of spell engines," Viridian concluded, and then sat down.