The First Mage

The air was filled with a kaleidoscope of vibrant flakes, cascading between the ground and the heavens above, against a backdrop of a purple sky. Some might’ve called the display mesmerizing, but to those who knew better, it was foreboding, danger lurking beneath its perceived beauty.

Dave scowled as he glanced up, his frustration plain. “The purple sky is back again as well... just fantastic,” he grumbled. “Do you know what this is about?”

His colleague’s voice remained calm and collected. “I’m afraid not,” he replied. “You’ve seen it before?”

“I have,” Dave hissed. “Miles said it was a bug, and it was gone in later stages. I thought he fixed it. Damn it, I should’ve paid more attention!”

He cursed Miles under his breath, his fingers tapping furiously against the floating screen in front of him. But despite his animosity, the majority of his frustration was directed at himself. He had let things spiral out of control, and now they were paying the price.

World “DL-115-063-017” had been the first work of a newly appointed architect. Miles was an ambitious individual, who attempted to bring ideas to life that defied the laws of nature that every world needed to adhere to. Determined to realize his wildest fantasies, he had been hell-bent on weaving magic, monsters, and mythical beings into the fabric of reality. And Dave had indulged him.

Miles had seemed smart enough to figure out his plans wouldn’t be feasible, but to Dave’s surprise, his ingenuity instead caused tangible results. He was dancing around established norms masterfully and had some early successes. Dave didn’t see the point in any of it, but he didn’t mind a little innovation in their otherwise stagnant field.

This apparent competence on Miles’ side contributed towards Dave giving him a pass when Null Energy—the very core of everything in existence—began streaming into the world uncontrolled. He was a busy man, and he assumed Miles would simply revert whatever he had done, but he couldn’t have been more wrong. And due to his inaction, he was as much to blame for it as the world’s architect himself.

“Damn it, damn it, damn it!” Dave cursed in frustration as he stared at his screen. “None of this is connected to our systems, how is this world even functioning!? None of this makes any sense!” He finally looked up and turned to his colleague. “How’s it going over th—”

But Dave’s words died in his throat as he saw the other architect sitting comfortably at a nearby table, drawing intricate scripts into the air with his finger. With each activation, a wild stream of Null Energy subsided, but he was just barely keeping them at bay. And yet, he seemed unfazed by the crisis.

“Are you kidding me?” Dave screeched. His manners had rarely escaped him to such a degree since he became an architect, but seeing this guy sit there, seemingly without a care in the world, infuriated Dave.

“Hm? What’s wrong?” His colleague glanced at him passively and followed Dave’s gaze down towards the chair he sat on. “Oh. There’s no need to stand the entire time, is there?”

Dave was reminded of Miles’ off-handedness, but he waved it off with an exasperated shake of his head as he tried to compose himself. “No, you’re absolutely right,” he said, taking a deep breath. “We need to stay calm and focused. I apologize for my outburst.”

“There’s no need for that. I understand your frustration. Nobody knows what’s going to happen if we don’t get this under control, right?”

Dave nodded, relieved that his concerns were shared. Watching his colleague move his hand through the air with practiced precision, he noted how lucky he was to have someone familiar with this world by his side during this time of crisis.

“Are these scripts in widespread use down there?” Dave marveled, his eyes scanning the intricate symbols hanging in the air. “It seems like you’re fairly used to the language.”

It was Dave who had remembered this particular script, having seen Miles use it once before to turn off a leak, but without his new hire, he wouldn’t have been able to reconstruct it. It was too complex to recall every detail of it, not to mention executing it flawlessly in quick succession.

“Widespread might be an overstatement,” the architect said, his smile awkward. “But there are a couple of people who understand Omega.”

The game of whack-a-mole continued, and as he finished another script, another leak was plucked, only for a new one to appear in short order. Dave began to feel the weight of the task at hand. “We’re not going to get anywhere like this... Even if I were to help, we’d only be holding it back. We don’t have a choice. The world needs to be opened back up.”

At these words, the other architect showed a hint of nervous emotion for the first time. “Open it? Is that possible? I thought once a world is locked in, that’s it.”

Dave’s expression turned deathly serious. “No, it can be done,” he explained. “We don’t usually reveal this to newcomers, so they put in more effort and strive for perfection from the get-go, but of course we need to be able to make modifications later on.”

The young architect’s mind was thrown into a frenzy by this revelation. The locking-in of worlds was crucial to establish a stable connection to the soul stream. It was a necessary step in the activation of the world, which allowed life to flourish, as souls attached to the creatures within. Reopening a world without cutting that connection was a technical impossibility, and without that connection, lifes would be lost. His voice trembled as he spoke, “B-but... won’t that destroy all life on this planet?”

Dave shot him a stern look. “That’s a little over-dramatic. The souls will detach and look for a new world to make their home. It might not be ideal, but we won’t be losing anything for good.” A rift appeared in the air as Dave prepared to leave. “You stay here and continue your work,” he commanded, “I’ll prepare everything.”

“Got it...” The architect's response was barely audible.

The unhappy expression on his colleague’s face gave Dave pause and made him think. Was the new guy too attached to physical existences? It wasn’t a desirable trait in an architect, but he was still new, and this was the last world he had called home. There might’ve even still been people alive down there he knew.

Dave could let it slide for now, but decided to at least say something. “Always remember,” he warned, “we’re here to cultivate souls, not the bodies they temporarily inhabit on their long road to the next stage.”

The architect thought for a moment before nodding firmly. “You’re right,” he said, a chortle escaping him. “How silly that I was worrying about my family for a moment. They will exist in the Outer Realm for eternity after all, and live thousands of lives.”

“Exactly.” Dave’s smile indicated his satisfaction. He had high hopes for this man becoming a good architect in time. “I’m off then, good luck,” he said before disappearing into the rift.

As soon as Dave and the rift vanished, the architect halted and glanced around to ensure his privacy. He then waved his hand through the air, clearing away all the scripts, and began to write a new, much more intricate one. Though it took three times longer than the others, after he activated it with a snap, every single Null Energy leak disappeared, leaving not one colorful flake left in sight.

“Looks like I can’t buy any more time...” he muttered, his gaze wandering upwards to the purple sky. “I better figure out how to fix this quickly. I kind of wish you were here, Miles... Or at least Riala,” he chuckled. After pumping himself up with a few quick breaths, a wave of his hand made a screen appear in front of him that contained nothing but an input field and an on-screen keyboard, their layout and design vastly different from the standard system used inside the Outer Realm. “Next time I get possessed by someone I’ll ask them for their passwords,” Tomar sighed.

***

The camp was filled with awe as the sky turned a light shade of purple, swallowing up the blue. At first, I couldn’t help but feel trepidation, but as I looked at it longer, and nothing else happened, the color became pleasing to the eye.

“This is... pretty,” I muttered absentmindedly, my thoughts lost in the sight before me.. “But why is this happening? It’s not normal, right?”

Berla and Riala, who had just said goodbye to us, were still standing next to Hati, and me on his back. Berla shook her head in amazement. “No, I’ve never seen the sky like that,” she said, her voice filled with wonder.

Hati turned his head to look up at me. “Miles, I smell mana in the air.”

“Mhm, I figured. I’m feeling something as well. I guess those two things are related somehow.”

A few of us appeared worried, while others took in the sight in fascination. The only one in the clearing that had a contemplative look on her face was Riala. She glanced back and forth between the ground and the sky, trying to recall something. After a moment, her eyes suddenly shot open. “Oh! Sis told me a story with a purple sky once!” she said happily.

“A story?” I asked, intrigued.

“Yea...” Deep in thought, she squinted her eyes and nibbled at her lower lip. “I think it was about a Fighter protecting a village.”

Hearing this jogged Aelene’s memory and she piped up, standing nearby amidst the others. “Right, I remember. It’s a children’s tale about a guard fighting off a horde of beasts,” she recalled. “I believe the sky turns purple right as he’s about to lose. He’s able to just barely turn things around after that. The purple sky is supposed to be somewhat of a good omen.”

“A good omen,” I mused, grinning. “I like the sound of that.”