The search through my father’s study for any clues as to where he may have hidden the relic of House Allur continued on, but I wasn’t having much success. It was already quite late when we got here, and every minute that passed only proved to show how tired I was. Since I had school in the morning, if I didn’t find it soon, I would have had to retire for the night soon. I could have probably spent another hour at most searching if I was really willing to push it. 

At this point though, it was looking like the search would have to be continued tomorrow, on Friday, and through the weekend after that, but then I had a moment of clarity and a bright idea came to me. One which I would have thought of much earlier if I hadn't been so tired.

"Hex, I’m trying to find something my father would have kept safe and secure. Do you know where I might find something like that?" I turned and asked the blue-skinned maid who was still standing at the ready to tend to my every need.

Throughout the dozen or so minutes I had spent searching, it was quite clear that my mother had actually made the golem she was playing with reach an orgasm, which made the functionality of their construction seem all the more impressive. However, my mother had apparently grown bored since then; either that or she was taking a break, as Hex was now easily able to respond to me without having to stifle moans and gasps of pleasure.

"Master, I am aware of everything that happens within the estate grounds and everything the previous master brought in since my creation, but your request is too vague. Many simple things could fit that description, and unless you want me to list them all out, you will need to be more specific."

"Okay, let's see…" I took a moment to recall everything Mum had told me about the relic from the stories passed down through her family from generation to generation. "Under no circumstances should you ever repeat what I’m about to tell you, but I’m looking for a powerful relic of divine power, from before the arcanists of old struck down the gods and ripped their divine cores from their very being."

"It should take the form of a crown, but it is possible that one of the previous Amonvars reforged it into a new, more inconspicuous form. Either way, it has the power to absorb sexual energies and empower the one who is soul bound to it, an effect that is much more potent for those who are descended from the bloodline of the ancient Allurian Kings and Queens like my mother and I are."

"Hmm…" Hex took a moment to think, something she had never done before as she was always been quick to respond to any of my queries. "I am not aware of any items matching that description, but there is one location where such an item could be hidden. Would you like me to point that location out to you, Master?"

"Yes, that would be great," I responded, only to be thoroughly surprised when the woman moved only a few steps to the other end of the study where she pointed out the window. "I can’t tell what you're pointing at, Hex. It will probably be easier if you just take me down to the estate grounds and show me in person."

"Apologies Master, but I am not pointing to a location on the ground floor, but the window itself." Hex bowed her head politely and gave her apologies, even though I was the one who misunderstood her. "This window is the only thing within the estate that I am physically unable to observe and something in my core programming is stopping me from even attempting to touch it."

"That is definitely weird…" I muttered as I reached out a hand, brushing my fingertips against the cold, smooth glass.

In every way, the glass looked and felt like that of an ordinary window. If not for Hex pointing out her inability to observe and touch this window, then I would have never thought to look at it further, but it's not surprising given my father’s unparalleled warding skills that he was able to make whatever enchantment lay here practically invisible.

Luckily for me, my father’s mana signature was embedded in my own, and if this enchantment was keyed to him, it was also keyed to me. As such, I summoned forth a few drops of mana and spread them out across the glass from the tips of my fingers. Until the glass began to slowly crack in response to my actions, it never dawned on me that my father could have trapped the enchantment leading to the object of power he kept secure above all else. But fortunately enough, it ended up actually not being trapped and the cracking effect continued along the entire length of the window until it shattered into shards that dissolved into the air as they fell.

Behind where the window once stood, the vista of the estate gardens was no longer present, as a swirling portal of blue and silver had taken its place. Without another second of thought, I ordered Hex to wait for my return and jumped through.

Unlike the usual feeling of nausea that was associated with teleportation magic, stepping through this portal felt like I was stepping through a thinly veiled curtain, hinting at the fact that I wasn’t actually being teleported anywhere. As I looked around the small domed walls of my surroundings, it became clear where this had led me.

"A demi-plane? Wow, I wasn’t expecting that." I chuckled to myself.

The room was about sixty feet wide and was shaped like the top half of a perfect sphere. The walls looked as if they were made out of ornate marble blocks, like that used in the manor outside, but since this was a demi-plane, the walls were most likely made to look like that and were actually just made from raw mana. The only actual thing in this open-spaced dome was a pedestal positioned in the dead centre of the room, upon which sat the object I came here in search of, a crown of pure gold encrusted with many sparkling amethysts.

Walking forward, intent on reclaiming the relic stolen from my mother’s side of the family for generations, I absentmindedly triggered a ward hidden in the stone flooring. A complex runic array lit up underneath me and circled around the pedestal with the crown sitting atop it. For a few moments, I feared that I had just triggered a trap that would turn me to ash in a matter of seconds, but then an illusion of my father appeared, standing between me and the crown. However, the illusion didn’t depict the grey-haired bag of bones that I saw only an hour ago, but the slick-haired, smug-looking appearance he took on when he was all glamoured up.

"If you are hearing this message, Alek, then it means that you were the one to trigger the wards I kept surrounding the crown behind me. Otherwise, it would have voided this demi-plane into oblivion, not that even that would have been strong enough to destroy this artifact." The illusion sighed as it said that last bit of information.

"I had hoped that no one would ever find it here and that eventually, all traces of its existence would die out, but if you are here, then it would seem like my hopes were in vain." The illusion of my father tried to explain itself, but all I could do was roll my eyes at it. "Alek, you must not use the crown. Under no circumstance should you ever so much as touch the damned thing. It is up to you to protect the world from what it contains, for this thing is a work of great evil and corruption."

"The forefathers of House Amonvar had the right idea when they joined Caellas’ founder in striking down the gods, but they should never have kept-" The illusion is cut off when I grew annoyed at the old man’s prattling and decide to send a burst of raw mana at it, momentarily dispelling it. Although it wasn’t a true dispelling and the illusion would reform eventually, I just didn’t want to hear him go on even though this was technically the most he had ever spoken to me. 

Why should I have listened to him? His ancestors, like all those who were descendants of the founding families, were responsible for the state that the world was in. While the high and mighty arcanists of the flying city lived it up in the safety and security of the society they had built in the sky, the rest of the world struggled to survive down on the earth, suffering through the aftereffects of the Godsfall, which had continued to plague the world even a thousand years after the founder’s accursed actions.

"How dare you say this crown is a source of evil when millions upon millions of innocent people are dead because of power-hungry archmages like you!" I shouted at the reforming illusion, which, of course, couldn’t have responded to me. 

Without wasting another second, I pushed through the wisps remaining of my father's magic and reached out to take the crown from its pedestal. The gold band encrusted with several bright and sparkly amethysts was lighter than I expected, but I could already feel through just a touch that it thrummed with great power.

As I slipped the crown onto my head, the world around me grew dark and I lost consciousness, or more specifically, my soul was drawn into the crown, something that I was not at all expecting.