Ar'Kendrithyst

Erick stepped down onto volcanic glass. The edges of the caldera were obsidian knife edges ripping at mist.

“Hello everyone, all Relevant Entities of the Script,” Erick said, Calling out to everyone listening. “I’d like to speak about some things happening on Fenrir right now, and in the near future. It’s time to air some grievances, and I’m going first.”

Rozeta, Phagar, Koyabez, and Melemizargo appeared, along with Atunir and her Champion Yetta, Champion Nirzir next to Phagar, and then Champion Fallopolis by Melemziargo. The other Relevant Entities stayed in the mist, seeming scared by Erick’s declarations.

That told Erick a lot. Why were they scared?

Erick wasn’t sure, but everyone here seemed wary, like they were expecting Erick to pull some shit… or something.

And then Fairy Moon and Shadow appeared, looking grim. Worried. Even more worried than everyone else.

Yeah. It had been time to have this conversation, before anything bad actually happened.

Erick said, “I am sure you all have seen some questionable actions on my part. I will not be accepting criticism at this time. I will, however, be giving criticisms, and yes, that seems unfair, but hear me out.

“I have heard some disturbing things. I have seen some questionable actions.

“I feel that I am the only one truly invested in this coalition right now, because every time any one of you looks at me I can tell you are somehow frightened. I will not go into details, because to nitpick is to pull apart the weave that holds us all together.

“We all want different things, but we also all want the same thing.

“We have all seen information out there that has twisted what we thought was real and revealed secrets we thought hidden.

“I’m here to say that literally none of that stuff matters, and we should institute a Forgotten Campaign against all of it, and against Nothanganathor, too.” Erick said, “History must be remembered, but it must also be worked through in times of peace, and we are not in a time of peace at all, and any of us listening to Nothanganathor at all is just poisoning the chances we have of pulling this off. Nothanganathor started off as an anti-meme to all of us, and we must return him to that.

“He should be recorded in side-ways, and never directly. His own words should not be allowed to exist and spread. We will know of him, but no one else will.

“He should be spoken about in the past tense, and in how we can make sure it never happens again.

“The ability for something to affect our unity should be reserved for those who desire to belong, or for those who we bring into compliance. Nothanganathor is none of that. We will ensure he has nothing, and especially not the ability to divide us and affect us at all. He is nothing, and he will have nothing.” Erick finished with, “That is why I say I will not be accepting criticisms, and why I only gave out the barest criticisms myself.”

The faces of the gods were careful things, but they all relaxed, as far as Erick could tell. Melemizargo looked quietly smug. Shadow and Fairy Moon were unsure… but they decided to believe.

Shadow waved a dismissive hand, saying, “I didn’t hear anything that needed to be spread.”

Fairy Moon added, “I wish a return to conversations of bountiful conclusions at your convenience, Rozeta.”

Rozeta looked at Fairy Moon and nodded. “We’ll speak more later.” She said to Erick, “I want my son cured, Erick, and soon… But beyond that grievance… We can’t actually Forget him.”

“We certainly don’t have to listen to him either, Rozeta,” Melemizargo said, “No matter how many Truths he speaks.”

Every single person here had been exposed to the Red and to Nothanganathor’s lies. Every single one of them had had their own horrors shown to them, in order to twist them. Like at that fungal Last Good Continent, Nothanganathor had seeded the very air to be destructive, while the faces of the people and the natures of the societies had been crafted to draw the gods and powers of Veird in, and then twist them while they were there.

Like with that Necromancer of Death’s; the gods had been forced to confront evils they had thought long dead, which injured them in their reprisal.

Like with the trauma that Quilatalap felt he had needed to simply erase from himself, and thus become someone he was not, everything here had been a trap.

Ten million traps might not kill a god, but they still left scars. They still sensitized.

In order to heal that hurt, and move on, Erick said, “I would like to speak of two things, and the first need not be talked about right now, while the second is more important for moving forward.

“First, I would like to discuss what a Forgotten Campaign would look like against Nothanganathor, for I feel that is one of the best ways to End this threat forever more. We can all think on that for a little while.

“Secondly, let us speak of Cascadio. I told everyone here that I was inviting him if I saw an opportunity, and I saw an opportunity, and he has been incredibly helpful in empowering the Valkyries to clear away the threats out there. He is a good guy, and yes, he’s a fractal god, but most gods in this universe are fractal gods.”

Melemizargo spoke first, “You keep speaking of him as a person, Erick, but he is not a person. He is a collective delusion. I understand how rich that is coming from me, when I used to say that about everyone here, but I can safely say that I was confused back then. I had mixed up some facts about the Pantheon, with their Dark-given Mantles, and the gods of the Fractal, and their similar-yet-different power. The fact that the Pantheon couldn’t even see Malevolence is what made me so crazy back then. Cascadio can’t see Malevolence, Erick, not if Malevolence doesn’t want to be seen.”

“Ah,” Erick said, looking around the caldera, at all the concerned faces, and at a few faces that were just now getting concerned. Demon King Dinnamoth was unaware that Cascadio couldn’t even see Malevolence. He made the connections between Melemizargo’s words and unsaid concerns just as fast as Erick, though. Erick said, “You’re all worried that he can’t see the Red in the sun and it is affecting him or his people.”

Rozeta said, “That is just one possible interpretation, though that is the main avenue through which we expect him to be turned into a weapon against us.”

Erick had what felt like a brilliant idea, so he asked, “Then how about we help him and help ourselves by attempting a ritual to help him help everyone who worships him? It would be a good way to strike out against Malevolence out there in the universe, and here on Fenrir. We’ve done a lot to clean up the space, but we can always make it better. Stronger.

“In fact, that might be one of the best exports of this land. Large rituals to grant favorable outcomes to the rest of the universe. Maybe through something Benevolence aligned? I still need to help out against corruption out there in the rest of the universe after we win this war, and this seems like a good way to do all of that at once.

“We could do a great many things to assist all the rest of this universe, and thus gain power for ourselves in turn.” Erick said, “We can even pick and choose the societies we wish to raise up, and the gods that sit upon those societies. When we can open the path back into the Dark, we can do so knowing we have allies everywhere out there.”

The room was stunned to silence.

Melemizargo grinned.

Erick said, “Anyway! War with Nothanganathor first. We’ll be ripping him out of everywhere. How should we best proceed?”

Fairy Moon spoke up, “We must make managed words, good Wizard Flatt, outside of outside observers, before you beckon the Ending of this Epic.”

Erick said, “That sounds fine to me. Nothanganathor’s shit doesn’t need to be spread around at all, but I can see the value in smaller discussions. Anyone wish to join us for a smaller talk?”

- - - -

On an illuminated moonsun hanging somewhere far away from Veird, Erick appeared amid the light pointed away from Fenrir. This particular moonsun was on top of a column of moonsuns, each of them glowing brightly, each of them made of white eternal stonewood towers and layers of land and ocean with waterfalls and life everywhere. Mostly light slimes. They drifted through the air like jellyfish, crowding out the sky and the land in flowing rivers of illumination. Beyond those slimes was the star-filled sky. For a normal person, that sky would be blocked by too much light, but Erick could see it just fine.

It was quite beautiful.

With an easy cast, Erick [Eternal Stonewood Shape]d a few of the nearby towers into a large platform, fit enough for a few tens of people.

Fairy Moon stepped out of swirling pink/green/white Springtime, and where she touched exploded with greenery and flowers. She was dressed normally, in her pink/green/white sundress and corset, her eyes a heterochromatic neon pink and nuclear green.

Shadow stepped out beside Fairy Moon, and the world was a little dimmer. The stars appeared in the sky, and the shadows deepened all around. She wore her Benevolent Dark Queen outfit, but trimmed down for more personal settings, with less ornamentation than usual.

Melemizargo lifted his draconic head on the side of the platform, casting the world into an illuminated sort of darkness. The light and the slimes were still there, shining like sunlight, but now there were shadows and dark, and even a normal person could have been able to see the land all around them. It had been too blinding before. A normal person might even appreciate this land in a blacklight-rave sort of setting, with radioactive-like mushrooms popping up here and there with floors and walls that glowed white. Melemizargo shrunk down, but not much. He hung on the side of the platform, floating lazily like he was swimming in water.

Erick smiled, and said, “It all looks a lot prettier when a whole bunch of different people gather here, bringing with them different ideas of what reality should be.”

None of his present company were appreciative of Erick’s call to pleasantries.

Shadow said, “I wish to air the first grievance: You will never love me, Erick.”

“Never is a long time, so I doubt that assertion very much,” Erick easily and instantly replied.

A moment passed.

And then Shadow looked mollified. Her greyish features pinkened a little. “Oh. Well. Of course. Obviously nothing will happen between us right now. Obviously. I drop my grievance.”

Erick nodded. “Who’s next?”

Fairy Moon asked, “Would you prevent us from purposing our population of people into the declaration of the New Dark?”

“Nope. Not at all.” Erick said, “I don’t want to know why you feel I would want to stop that.”

Fairy Moon nodded with understanding.

Melemizargo stared, asking a hard question, “Do you have designs upon my Mantle, Erick?”

“No.”

Melemizargo breathed, and then said, “Not a good enough answer.”

Erick frowned a little. “I don’t want to be a god. I want to be me. I believe my track history has made that clear.”

“You could be both. I am both, all the time. You could easily live a life, and then return to your past and deal with all your godly duties. Or you could elevate Shades to power to do all of your duties for you. You might not be a physical god in this new world you are trying to create, but when you speak of us working together to sell ritual services to phantom gods and gain power across an entire universe, you are speaking as though you are already a god.” Melemizargo looked at him. “Which you almost already are.” Melemizargo allowed no reply. He continued, “Are you aware that your woman, Teressa, is trying to contact the Dark and make inroads on your behalf? Or that Poi is trying to become an avatar of you, to help you deal with everything coming down the road? Or that Shivraa is a spiritual leader, and the Valkyries could easily raise you to godhood with a simple request from you?

“Are you aware that people are worshiping you as though you are me?”

Erick had known some of that.

He had not known that Melemizargo was much more than concerned. He was verging on fury.

Erick discarded his initial reaction to be mad that Melemizargo was thinking like this at all. Erick started tackling Melemizargo’s points, saying, “I have heard that Teressa is trying to contact the Dark through her Mark, through her Personal Script, but I have not heard her make any progress on that. She intends to ask the Dark to not let Nothanganathor win. This seems normal to me. If this is unacceptable, then please let me know. I had no idea this was unacceptable.

“Poi is trying to find himself, as far as I understand, through collective cultivation. His goal is to become an Ascendant Mind, through himself from all side realities. He is going to discard his body soon. I worry for him, because bodies seem important, but it is what he wants and I am supporting him in that.

“Shivraa does worship me, but in an idolized sort of way. I don’t believe it is true worship. Is a call to community the same as worship? Or do I misunderstand Shivraa?

“I was aware that some people are confusing you for me, but I have never facilitated this belief—”

“You aren’t doing enough to stop that belief, either,” Melemizargo said, way too strongly.

Ah.

Erick saw it now.

Melemizargo was starting to spiral.

Erick had assumed that Melemizargo had made peace with his death, for that is how it appeared the last time they spoke.

The dragon had not made peace with his death at all. He had been hiding his existential terror. He was worried, terrified, furious, and then back to worried, for he was not able to do a damned thing to stop himself from feeling those things. He had no power—

Oh.

Shit.

He was probably losing power, too, wasn’t he.

Nothanganathor had thrown off his Curse of Obscurity, according to him. He had become True Wizard, and then fae, and now he was waiting to be assigned God of Magic by the Dark. Just that; ‘waiting’. Not even actively pursuing power. His star was on the rise.

Melemizargo’s star had to be fading.

Melemizargo had finally come out of the trap, of the cage that Nothanganathor had made for him out of Veird, in the Sundering, but now the trap had become a death bed.

Erick asked, “What do you want me to do about it?”

Melemizargo said, “You fight him, now. If we fail, then we try again. No more preparation. No politicking with the Red reflections of your people of Veird. No determination of right and wrong, and threading needles and designing compromises between morality and necessity.

“We go.

“We kill.

“And then you fix what comes next so it doesn’t happen that way.”

Erick had no fucking clue how to make Melemizargo’s demand a reality, but he felt his Dark Mark sing to him and his Lightning Path tell him something very important. He chose not to speak about the making of universes from living sacrifices, as they had done to The Prince, and also the Goddess of Knowledge at the start of the Script, and instead said, “Then [Witness] a war for the fate of it all, Dark God of Magic.”

- - - -

All of Veird was a veined mass of power that collected in certain ways, and one of those ways was known as the Heart of Melemizargo, or the Well of Darkness.

Just like how Elemental Exalted and Vile collected into places that then collected the souls of angels and demons, thus making a heaven for those creatures, Darkness gathered inside the hearts of every Marked person on the planet, and in the universe. That power flowed where it could. And when it could, it flowed here.

Erick stood with Fallopolis at the turning of a corner, in a dungeon underneath Ascendant Mountain. There used to be lots of dungeons in this land, back when it was a place for shadelings to live and for outsiders to challenge, to prove themselves. It had all been destroyed by a Red Leviathan attack when Erick had been at Margleknot, but Erick had restored the main part of the mountain when he came back. The main part now housed this dungeon, and the Heart of Melemizargo within this dungeon.

There was nothing else.

An entrance held in the shadows and gloom behind them, while underfoot stood the white stone rim of a pool 30 meters across. Within that pool rested Absolute Black. It hurt to look upon. The Black called to Erick, in ways that he hadn’t been called in a long time, and in ways he easily recognized.

Once upon a time, Erick had fallen in that pool and he did not die. He merely moved across the world, to where he needed to be.

The Dark knew where Erick had to go right now.

Nothanganathor hid on some other sun, in some other slice of infinity near this place, biding his time until he Ascended to Dark Godhood, without lifting another claw to actually make it happen. It would be nearly impossible to find him, and it would be trivial for him to escape somewhere else, but the Dark knew where he was. The Dark could take him there, and ensure he arrived at the right time to kill the Red Bastard.

Like a time long ago, Champion of the Dark Fallopolis would be his guide.

Fallopolis stood, her frizzy white hair pulled into a tight bun, her grandmotherly body bedecked in a sparkly black suit, while her black kendrithyst staff floated to her side. She looked ready.

Erick was mostly ready. When they reached Nothanganathor, he would pull his Valkyries to the battlefield, and then the real war would begin.

Everyone else would remain here, on Veird and Fenrir, securing the land against danger.

Erick stared at the Absolute Black of the Well of Darkness and took a moment to truly consider what it meant to step through that portal.

“It’s almost better this way,” Erick said. “No need to endanger everyone, and they need to be back on Veird for the counterattack.”

Fallopolis said, “When you win, you can come back through time and fix whatever he does in retaliation.”

Erick grinned. “You ready to give it your all, too, Fallopolis?”

“I am, and I might even take up my real name after this, but I am unsure.”

Erick smiled softly at that. “Ar’Kendrithyst fell a long time ago.”

Fallopolis shook her head lightly. She did not agree. “It took me a while to understand why I never picked my old name back up, but now I know. It was more than the fact that I lived and breathed that place for centuries. The truest fact is we’ve never left Ar’Kendrithyst. Physically, yes, but not spiritually. There are always horrors that seek to destroy, dangers in the Dark, tests of power and tests of resolve. Quilatalap exemplified and codified that nature of the Dark, of the true purpose behind Ar’Kendrithyst at his Armory. He still does that to this day with his dungeons.

“But Ar’Kendrithyst was larger than the Armory. It was larger than the dungeons. Those are just the organized places. The Shade-filled insanity horror of Ar’Kendrithyst is the true danger. Ar’Kendrithyst was a crucible, and crucibles still exist everywhere. We can explore, we can learn, and we try to leave, but we can never really leave that Dead City, filled with tests both mundane and magnificent. Dead, wrong-headed metropolises still exist everywhere. They will always continue to exist. They will grow brilliant and wonderful at first, or maybe they start off horrible. Some will turn malignant.

“And so, sometimes those metropolises must fall.”

Fallopolis thumped the end of her kendrithyst staff against the white stone ground. The air cracked. A ripple passed through the Absolute Black of the Heart of Melemizargo, and then the ripple rebounded.

The air gonged.

Fallopolis raised her voice high, casting her power deep, “We see our true enemies! The city that they are trying to build out of corpses that don’t belong to them! The wrongness that they are seeking to expand!” Her voice expanded, and the world focused. “We know the architect of it all! Of the cause of the Insanity of My God! Of the cause of the Twisting of the Clergy! Of the creator of the Sundering!” She raised her kendrithyst staff high above the white rim of the Well of Darkness. “We see you now, Nothanganathor!”

And then she smashed her kendrithyst staff down.

The white Well broke like the shattering of magic, releasing the Absolute Black inside like an explosion of ink underwater.

Erick fell through tearing, ripping Darkness, and Fallopolis fell beside him. Erick grabbed onto her hand, and Fallopolis howled with laughter as the world became a tunnel. Suddenly, Erick was a dragon again and Fallopolis was a thing of Black, with eyes and mouths and focus extraordinary, shaped like a gibbering demon and person all at the same time. She pointed with ten million fingers, claws, fangs, and eyes, into the Dark.

The world flexed—

- - - -

— Erick dropped out of a tangle of black that became Fallopolis and then pulled away, injured heavily. Erick became his full size and Fallopolis shrunk down to her normal body, exhausted and broken, which made sense considering what they had dropped into.

The void around them was a thing of cutting, burning Malevolence, and Fallopolis had just broken through all of it to bring them here. Nothanganathor had indeed left traps for people to fall into, if they ventured his way, and Fallopolis had broken through many of them, injuring her in ways that Erick wasn’t quite prepared to heal. But Fallopolis was a Champion. She just needed some time.

Erick wrapped her in a protective [Hasted Shelter] that she could break if she wanted, but it would be enough to let her recover. And then Erick stepped sideways in time, divorcing himself from the normal flow, taking it all in as fast as he could, because something was already starting to drag him back to normal time. The traps all around him were myriad in their layers.

He and Fallopolis had popped out of the breaking of the Well of Darkness by a big blackened world, maybe a moon’s distance away. It was blackened by the scorching of the Red Sun in the distance.

All of Reality was a wash of Red and Void, spiraling out from a caustically brilliant Red Sun. There was a body on that sun. Nothanganathor’s body. Like a black noodle floating in a nuclear-red hot sauce, or a tapeworm in blood, Nothanganathor’s body coiled this way and that upon the sun.

It had been chunked.

The head was half gone; the lower jaw was still attached to the skull, but the upper jaw and most of the skull was opened and smashed upon the sun's surface. Several hundred world-lengths down from the head the body just stopped, for something had eaten the body. The body resumed beyond that, but it was broken into many different pieces.

Something was eating it.

Someone was eating it.

Erick saw who was eating it, there, at the third break in the length of the body.

There was a white, snake-like dragon down there, gorging on the body. Red Lightning flashed out of the white worm, burning away the big corpse, turning that big corpse into power that flowed into the white worm’s open maw.

The white worm was Nothanganathor, looking sleek and whole, and not like his larger corpse at all. He was, perhaps, a few worlds long. Hard to say from this distance.

Erick realized a few things as he looked at Nothanganathor.

The Erased One was still shaped like a leviathan, but he had a crown of 6 horns now, just like Melemizargo, just like Erick. He looked more like Rozeta or the dragons of Veird than any leviathan. He had scales now; not just skin.

So he had broken his Curse of Obscurity, then. That had been true.

And yet, he was still eating his corpse.

He hadn’t finished his transition to fae yet, had he? Had he even truly begun?

Erick felt joy at recognizing that Truth. Erick’s own transition had started with him eating his Benevolence-crafted space ship, Worldsaver, and then waking up in the past, in 1997, and then solidifying the Truth of his time on Earth over the course of the next 23 years. Nothanganathor’s transition somehow had him eating the corpse of his old body. In a way, both of them had eaten their own history, but Nothanganathor hadn’t gotten through the first part of all that. He hadn’t eaten all of himself yet, because of course he hadn’t eaten all of himself. He probably had too much to eat!

Ha!

The lying bastard wasn’t a fae yet.

Erick cupped his wings and raised his elated voice, calling out with a blast of light that shredded the Red violence in the air all around him, “Liar liar LIFE on FIRE!”

Erick had touched upon a Truth so primal that it echoed upon itself, gaining strength even as it tore through the Red all around, his wave of White shattering the void and the traps in the air and then echoing out of the sun itself. Nothanganathor was a speaker of half-truths and obscured reality, who had built his entire existence upon hiding and stealing and claiming credit for things he did not do, and now, here at his Ascension to Fae, those falsities were coming home to roost; Erick ensured it.

The void flickered White, and Erick stripped away Nothanganathor’s immunity to nuclear fire.

Nothanganathor’s larger corpse burned in rapid explosions of meat flash frying and exploding from steam eruptions. The sun was still the sun, after all. Flesh went first. Bone followed fast. Nothanganathor’s smaller self roared as he realized that Erick was here, and that his bounty was burning.

Nothanganathor froze the sun, stopping the explosions of flesh, but Erick had eradicated half of it with one call to Truth.

That attack had worked a lot better than Erick thought it would have worked, but —Erick smiled— shedding light was one of the best ways to reveal everything for what it was.

Erick declared, “The Welcoming Dark will not accept you as you are, Nothanganathor! So BURN in the LIGHT, and be transformed in this trial!”

Erick’s voice echoed upon itself again, bouncing out faster than the speed of light, crashing into that blackened planet down to the left, revealing the bright red boughs of Everbless, and Red Lightning among his stormy leaves. The wayward brother of Yggdrasil, Erick’s own son, captured by the Red, screamed in agony as White tore at him, shredding his canopy and breaking half of his body.

Oozy stood at the center of that canopy, shielding Everbless from the majority of Erick’s Light.

Fallopolis broke out of her safety shell like a hurricane of darkness, filled with eyes and teeth and vengeful words, whispering a thousand different angers and guarantees of how she wouldn’t let Everbless or Oozy live. She rode Erick’s wave of light down onto that blackened planet and engaged the enemy in a conflagration of black ooze. She was truly now an [Avatar of Melemizargo].

The White wave continued on, though. It echoed faster and deeper as it passed that planet, and as it rocked against the sun.

Nothanganathor flickered to stand in the way of the blast, but he was just the size of a few Jupiters and Erick’s attack was larger than that. The white wave hit the sun and Nothanganathor’s [Time Lock] that protected his body. The body began to burn again, though it was slower this time.

Nothanganathor spoke, “I don’t need it anymore.”

Another lie through half-truth; he didn’t need it, but he still wanted it. The protective magics that Nothanganathor had set down upon the large corpse remained there, fighting to keep the body from fully combusting.

Nothanganathor advanced on Erick, like a snake swimming through the ocean, body twisting, eyes focused.

Erick called out, “You said we would fight as universes the next time we met, and here you are talking! Even more lies from the liar! Your Truth is a cloudy, broken thing, so let it burn in the light!”

White flames erupted out of Nothanganathor’s sun corpse and flickered across his smaller body.

And then he was suddenly there, his jaws open wide enough to swallow Erick whole. There seemed to be another Red Sun inside his gullet.

Erick stepped out of time and circled around to Nothanganathor’s back where he breathed a line of [Luminous Beam]s wider and stronger than ever before. Blasts of power impacted Nothanganthor’s skull, moving faster than the speed of light. It was like spraying water from a hose at a dune. Flesh parted and exploded away from where Erick’s beam touched, but it still was the touch of a raindrop upon an ocean.

Erick whispered into Infinity, “To me, my Valkyries.”

The White wave, still spilling out in the distance, flickered and twisted. Ten thousand portals opened like a layer of new stars, but nearby and filled with warriors.

Shivraa roared forward first, raising her ice sword and screaming vengeance, heralding the flood.

- - - -

Teressa pulled back from the Darkness and once again inhabited her body, in the prognostication offices of House Benevolence. She got up and rushed to the wall and slammed the big red button that they had set up years ago for a possible Red event. She hadn’t needed to slam that button in a long while, but she slammed it now, even as she started sending out [Telepathy] messages to everyone she knew to send them.

The alarm started blaring.

It was still a minute before Red descended upon Fenrir.

- - - -

Erick threw Bolts at Nothanganathor, to test their power. Red Lightning stretched out of the white serpent, grasping every Bolt and draining it into him. He was using his Sign of Power that he had stolen from Margleknot and used to kickstart the Sundering, to drain away all the magic that touched him.

It was an act of parity, for Erick did the same for every spell Nothanganathor threw his way, whipping out [Mana Siphon]s like ten million shadowy tendrils, stealing all the power that Nothanganathor dared to let into Erick’s purview.

- - - -

Poi got Teressa’s message and then corroborated it along ten different vectors. All across Fenrir, all across Veird, and the moonsuns, and everywhere that Poi could reach, he caught word of Valkyries vanishing through portals. The Crossroads was alive with news happening from all areas of everywhere.

Ascendant Prime stepped into the Crossroads like a very heavy spider, and soon all the other Ascendants joined him. There was only one directive.

‘The Apparent King goes to war against the Red. Prepare for the counterattack.’

- - - -

Nothanganathor twisted reality itself, trying to Step away from the battle, to escape.

Erick stated, “No more running.”

And that was just about the only Wizardry that worked very, very well, for Nothanganathor had tried to threaten him with an ultimate fight if Erick ever showed his face. Well here he was, showing his face! Time for the fight.

Nothanganathor turned and made the mistake of attempting to breathe Malevolence at Erick.

Erick turned that power into his own, ripping at the Red with White, turning it pink and then dead and ready for eating, which is what he did next. All the while, the Valkyries nipped at Nothanganathor from every angle. He was several worlds long and every bit of Siphon counted.

Meanwhile, Nothanganathor’s original body, his corpse left upon the sun, was like firecrackers tossed into lava; it exploded here and there and it didn’t stop exploding at all.

The Valkyries feasted on that corpse, too.

- - - -

Evan had been feeling uneasy all day long. He had gone through reports from every Problem Area of Fenrir, and the steps being taken to solve those problems, but the job was literally too large for him and House Benevolence. They did what they could, though. Mostly they analyzed possible solutions to this Area or that Area and then put those solutions into the outgoing box in father’s office.

Those reports vanished the very second they were laid down. Sometimes they vanished before that, as the analyzer walked with the finished report in that direction.

Evan had attributed his unease toward the chaotic, absolute necessity of the job ahead of them.

But then the alarm went off while Evan was in the middle of working on Problem Area 187 with his team.

Zorik, Castellan Zolan’s grandson and Paladin of Rozeta and Evan’s boyfriend, startled. His eyes flickered Script-blue as he read instructions from Rozeta. That’s when Evan started to panic, and then his panic gave way to utter certainty.

He already knew what was happening.

Ophiel opened a portal in the middle of Evan’s offices, among his team. He fluffed out his iridescent black wings and said, “I need you. I already got the girls and every other dragon I could find. Dad is moving on Nothanganathor right now.”

Evan nodded.

Yup. That’s what Evan had expected.

Evan grabbed Zorik, kissed him once, said, “Love you. See you later.”

Zorik was still in the middle of receiving instructions from Rozeta, his eyes still clouded with blue.

Evan followed Ophiel onward, into Benevolence Itself, where ten thousand other portals were open into ten thousand other lands, and people were moving fast. Yggdrasil was already directing people this way and that with rainbow streamers in the air, directing people and moving them at the same time, but people mostly knew where to go on their own.

Most of the people were Valkyries.

Zorik called out, “Love you, too!”

Evan twisted back, grinned, and—

The portal closed.

Ophiel said, “Sorry. Dad can do time tricks. I cannot. Go there.” He pointed at a portal in the sky. It was one of the closer ones, where the Valkyries were not headed at all. “You’re on a diplomatic/violence mission to help them fight the Red beasts that are appearing right now. It’s the Crystal Forest but Bulgan killed dad at the start of Candlepoint. Dad killed Bulgan and a few other bad people this time, again, but left them pretty much alone because they told him to go away because he looked like Melemizargo. Some people accepted his Personal Scripts, but not many.” Ophiel spoke much faster, “There’s 175 million people in that Crystal Forest for some reason! Tell them the basics or frighten them into believing you! I suggest the second option for expediency's sake! Go go go!”

Evan moved, flying fast, kinda awed at how much Ophiel knew and understood, and at how much organization his ‘little’ brother was doing right now. The entirety of Benevolence Itself was filled with portals, like dark stars leading from light into anything else besides light—

There, in the far, far distance, and in a way Evan only caught a glimpse of, was a sky full of black stars. Valkyries flew up through rainbow roads, traveling in the millions, so dense they looked like lines of blackgold fire. Those weren’t stars up there. They were portals into some other place. Some dark land.

The big battle.

Evan wanted to go, but he knew where he needed to be, and it wasn’t in the middle of a Wizard War. Evan’s place was anywhere other than a Wizard fight. Those Valkyries were probably dying just as fast as they were flowing into that other space. Evan imagined they got pulped and then reborn on Fenrir, near their [Spellsurge Weave]s, and every single Valkyrie would be making that flight to the final battle multiple times.

Evan flew toward his own portal, catching glimpses of all the true organization happening behind the scenes, and he was awed by Ophiel again. He glimpsed Ophiel yelling at Jane and Candice that they couldn’t go to the battle with Nothanganathor. The argument didn’t last long, thankfully. Just some yelled words. And then Candice and Jane went through the same portal, to some other necessity out there in Fenrir.

Wherever they went was likely a semi-Wizard fight. Maybe against Oozy? Who knew.

And then Evan flickered through his portal, and the portal closed behind him.

He floated above the Crystal Forest, on Fenrir. Or at least a version of the place. This one was on the exterior, so the sky was full of sunmoons and stars. Evan smiled as he saw this Crystal Forest. It was partially green. In this version of this world, Dad had probably started throwing out rain everywhere.

But then Bulgan had killed him at Candlepoint.

Welp!

Evan turned into a 50 meter long magenta dragon, and then he started Air Stepping around, getting a look at the place.

Red tears in the air started to appear almost right away, and Claws started to poke into this space.

Evan organized his thoughts. He still had access to mana through his Personal Script. Who to contact?

Did Poi exist in this world?

Evan focused on Poi, and then sent out a mental request to whatever passed for the Crossroads around here, ‘Hello, Poi. Is this Poi?’

Some Mind Mage grabbed his thoughts and wrangled them. ‘This is Rizala Fulisade! How do you know my brother’s name?!’

Evan focused, ‘I’m going to send you an information packet. I also need to start organizing the defense of this land. You’re being attacked by anti-memetic beasts. Here.’

Ten very, very long seconds later, and Rizala sent back, ‘Fuck! Okay. I have no mana. I consumed half of that package just to be able to read it. I’m only able to communicate with you because you have the connection open and some people have these Personal Scripts to make a mini-Crossing. Where are you?’

Evan floated, gigantic and draconic over a different version of Spur. A few things were different, but the city was still orange rock, just like Evan remembered back when he was Jane. The Farms still existed, which was nice. The whole place looked quite desolate, though.

The people of Spur panicked, as was expected, though they mounted no defense. How could they, without the Script? Without mana?

Evan sent, ‘I’m the magenta dragon with the wings.’

‘… Yes. I see.’

‘I am willing to use violence to save you. I am archmage level and my magic won’t unravel in this space like yours is unraveling. Those among you who have a Personal Script might be able to survive contact with the enemy, but the enemy is already attacking. Put me in touch with them. I will be directing combat and fighting the main Claws that come.’

‘… You really are his son.’

‘I am.’

‘This is what needs to happen...’

- - - -

Zooming across Nothanganathor’s back, dodging twists of dragonspines as the former-leviathan twisted, trying to catch him, Erick cascaded spill after spill of reson-empowered [Luminous Beam]s. Light burned through five layers of flesh at once, carving continent-sized wounds in Nothanganathor. Blood and bone appeared in those wounds, and then Erick tore deeper, and Nothanganathor twisted. Bone and blood blasted away, but this time it revealed scales underneath.

Nothanganathor sloughed off the damage exactly like a snake shedding his skin, becoming smaller now, but in the way that an ocean was smaller after it evaporated for a day.

Nothanganathor tried to collect his discarded flesh, that matter turning into Malevolence that then twisted back to him, but Valkyries feasted, roasting dragon meat with blackgold fire and drinking it down before Nothanganathor could take his power back.

“Parasites! Parasites all of you!” Nothanganathor roared.

His voice was an echo that blasted apart 1,248 valkyries that were too close and injured another 3,551. The first ones reformed somewhere back beyond the distant portals, while the second group merely regrew broken limbs and missing torsos with a rush of Carnage and Blood magic.

Several of them turned into actual parasites, though, and Erick sent a flicker of [Grand Reincarnation] lightning at those unfortunate people, sending them off to live other lives, in other parts of the universe, removing all of Nothanganathor’s influence and ensuring it wouldn’t come back. Erick had taken lesser measures to remove some of Nothanganathor’s wizard tricks earlier in the battle, and that was how he had lost a million Valkyries to Nothor Beasts and Claws ripping up the backlines, out of Erick’s sight, attacking the [Spellsurge Weave]s that held together several Valkyrie groups.

He’d get them back if he could, but—

Nothanganathor twisted. The fabric of reality pulled inward. Valkyries got closer, even though they didn’t mean to, because Nothanganathor had turned time on an axis, pointing it toward himself, declaring himself Inevitable in that action. It seemed like a test of his nascent and approaching Mantle of the Dark God of Magic.

The Valkyries could do nothing but get closer to him, and that is when he shot out Red Lightning and turned ten thousand Valkyries into splashed blood that slipped into that Lightning and then drowned into Nothanganathor’s wounds.

He was restored, just a little, in the way that an ocean was deeper after the sky rained for an hour.

That right there seemed to be a common use of his Sign of Power; the thing he had twisted Margleknot’s Mark of the Fractal into, in order to Sunder the Painted Cosmology.

It would have been another million Valkyries gone into his Sign of Power, but Erick stepped through time and prevented that particular disaster.

Nothanganathor turned his eyes toward Erick, watching him with orbs the size of moons, as Erick moved through Time itself. The bastard was watching and organizing an attack, so Erick stopped moving in that way, returning to strafing runs of [Luminous Beam]s. Nothanganathor roared out hate, his flesh blasting away as he once again twisted around to mitigate the damage, to aim claws at Erick, or to try and carve Erick from flight with any number of spines lining his body.

Erick dodged them all and blasted away continents of flesh.

It looked impossible. It looked like too much for any one fae to deal with. And it was. Nothaganathor had prepared countermeasures that he pulled out of Red Lightning like he was pulling out bazooka cannons in a fistfight. But Erick stepped in from the future and dismantled magic. He cast Nothanganathor’s tricks into Infinity, shoving those tricks into the sun, and when that didn’t work, he swallowed sun-ending trinkets with well-timed portals opened to the Whirlpool. The Whirlpool was still active over on that other slice of infinity, after all.

Stuff that was worse than Annihilation splashed this way and that, eradicating Nothanganathor’s trinkets and magic, for the Whirlpool was utter destruction. It was hard to predict when a splash of that destruction was angled in a useful way, to produce a rush of power that Erick brought through one portal, annihilating a trinket, and then swallowing that splash of Whirlpool right back to where it came from. But Erick had a lot of time on his hands.

The battle was going well.

Erick and his Valkyries were winning. Veird was winning.

They could win this.

Erick dodged Red Lightning, and when he failed to dodge it, he pushed away those Futures where he died. When Nothanganathor Established deaths, Erick Established escapes from death.

Nothanganathor was just a wizard; a proto-fae. A single man with a lot of tricks, most of which burned away with his body on the sun. Erick and his people were a lot more than that.

And yet…

And yet, Erick blasted away continents worth of flesh, Mana Siphoning all the power that came his way and allowing the Valkyries to collect what remained. Nothanganathor attacked and struggled, and Erick evaded in all the ways he could, getting away from every counter attack.

Erick had stopped using normal magic a while ago, for Nothanganathor could suck that up with his Sign of Power, and Nothanganathor did the same, using trick after trick to attack Erick, every way he could.

Nothanganathor seemed to have endless tricks, but high-energy Particle Magic seemed to be the best thing to use against him, since it was the only thing he couldn’t siphon away with his Sign of Power. Erick was well equipped to do that, and it barely cost any mana at all. He was spending resons like water, though.

… Wait.

Was Nothanganathor spending any resons at all?

Why hadn’t Erick realized that earlier—

Nothanganathor suddenly erupted in laughter, the sound of it coming from every angle, like an echo that surrounded—

Erick was inside of a stomach. He didn’t know how he had gotten there, but he was inside of a world-sized stomach. Acid burned the void all around like caustic corruption, twisting reality into digestible mana. Erick Stepped out of the trap, into the void, lit by the Red Sun. Nothanganathor swallowed a few thousand more Valkyries while Erick reoriented—

Nothanganathor’s belly sealed back up, the wound Erick had exited from healing in a flash of Red.

“Almost got you with that one!” Nothanganathor said, as he whipped his head back around to glare at Erick, his eyes shimmering Red. “You should have prepared more!”

Erick had prepared enough, for he had tricks he hadn’t used yet, too. The big ones.

He decided to use one trick, though.

Erick punched Nothanganathor.

They were both human in that throwing of that punch, each floating in the void. Erick knocked out teeth and Nothanganathor’s brain rattled as blood went flying. That blood turned into Valkyries that flew away as fast as magically possible. Erick punched the dazed bastard in the stomach again, caving in bone and breaking spine.

And then Nothanganathor recovered, twisting into the punch like a swallowing maw of his true self, rapidly returning to full size and snapping down on Erick’s still-human body.

Erick wasn’t in that maw at all. He was by Nothanganathor’s eye.

Erick raked dragon claws across Nothanganathor’s eye, for Erick had become a dragon again, and much bigger than before. Nothanganathor was still the size of several Jupiters, but Erick was bigger, now. Almost as big as one of Nothanganathor’s eyes.

Nothanganathor pulled away, one eye closed, blood seeping.

Erick held up a red gem. “Got your eye!”

Resons poured out of Erick as the gem became a real eye, sized to Erick’s fist. He crushed the eye and Nothanganathor raged. The white serpent wasn’t really blinded at all, but he wouldn’t be getting that eye back without actually trying for it.

The fight resumed.