Lillene

Enjoy!

Serenity went from light to darkness, then to light again. The light was dimmer the second time, more bearable. He saw all of A’Atla, both the surface and the depths, from the spire that was slowly emerging as the building that had hidden it was blasted away by overwhelming mana to the dead spot wrapped in mana-resistant stone. He somehow knew it was only mana-resistant and not mana-proof even before he saw that a little mana still leaked through it, but he also knew that on this scale it was a distinction without a true difference.

Somehow, he was in all of A’Atla and he was in Gaia’s World Core chamber at the same time. It gave him a scale that he’d never had before; he’d thought the mountain-sized chunk of World Core crystal was huge. In comparison to Gaia’s crystal, it wasn’t. In fact, it was only about four times the size of the death-tainted crystals he’d cleaned up the first time he’d seen Gaia’s core. 

Serenity wondered what that meant. Was it really size? Earth’s core was, physically, hundreds of miles across. That would dwarf a small mountain more than this seemed to. Perhaps Gaia’s core space didn’t take up the entire core of the planet or perhaps it wasn’t a physical representation at all. 

Either way, it told Serenity something about the scale of the mining operation on Lyka; while he’d found a lot of greenstone, it wasn’t anywhere near a full mountain of the stuff. Even with the loss of Aeon’s core crystal and all the greenstone, Lyka hadn’t been reduced much in size. It did make him wonder about Aeon, though; Aeon was both immensely smaller than Lyka and far more active. Perhaps they were related or perhaps it was simply the damage.

It also gave some perspective on the damage to Tzintkra’s core. Tzintkra was fragile when Stojan Aith broke some off and stole it for her own use. It might explain why Tzintkra still hadn’t healed from the war that ravaged its surface, but it wasn’t the cause of the devastation. Serenity knew that, theoretically at least, but this made it even clearer.

Gaia’s Guardian, D’Nehr, was there. He floated silently next to Gaia’s core in the middle of the empty space in one of Serenity’s views.

“Serenity. I can feel you, but it wavers.” Gaia’s voice was no longer the all-encompassing Voice it had once been. Instead, she sounded like a person speaking from next to Serenity, though he knew it came from her core. Her core was both next to him and far away at the same time. “There is an echo. The nexus must be anchored or the imbalance will spread.”

Serenity wasn’t certain what he could do. He reached for his magic; it was there one moment and gone the next before reappearing once more. That wasn’t even close to steady enough to build a proper spellform. “I don’t think I can do the spell I did in the past.” 

“That spell wouldn’t serve in any case.” Gaia sounded calm and unhurried. “It couldn’t hold the power. The anchor must be the mountain you found; I can feel it. It is the center of the echo and also the solution to it. It is not quite at the gathering point, which is why it is echoing, I think, but anchoring either end of the echo should work and that one simply requires power to anchor.”

“Why wasn’t it echoing before?” Serenity wished he knew more about ley lines, but he rather strongly suspected that only planets and the Voice knew enough to actually manage something at this scale. It was not something that would happen very often; it couldn’t be. That meant there really wasn’t any good way to learn about it.

“It was.” Gaia’s voice sounded serious, almost grim. “There simply wasn’t much power there because it was being pulled somewhere else. The echo is why I couldn’t hear you and why I couldn’t see the nexus; it was sufficient to hide it. I suspect it was accidental, but the presence of the World Core crystal certainly is not. You will have to look into where it all went once we have prevented this from causing any worse issues.”

Serenity didn’t want to ask if “worse issues” included cracking Earth’s core; he didn’t want or need to know. This had to be fixed even if the consequences were “only” a magical hurricane. 

Gaia’s next words were more information that he wanted. “No matter what we do, this will probably settle out on its own eventually. You do not have to do anything; what I would like you to do is very dangerous and could kill you. If you want, I can help you return to A’Atla and I will handle this without you.”

Serenity’s first impulse was to turn Gaia down; this was his responsibility. He forced himself to fairly evaluate her offer, instead. Was it really his responsibility? Yes, he’d blocked the drain, but none of them had expected consequences like this. Wasn’t the real responsibility with whoever set up the situation?

Well, some of it was his. He shouldn’t try to claim all of it, though. He could go and punch a hole in the plug if he wanted to; it might even help in the short term. It wouldn’t fix the problem they were trying to solve. So, partial responsibility. Did that mean he had to be involved in fixing it? Well, no, but again … who else was better suited for it? 

“Will the solution be as good if I don’t help?” That was the real question, wasn’t it? He wasn’t afraid of death; he knew Death as an old friend. A quiet one, but not one he’d fear. More than that, he was very, very hard to actually kill. Disability was possible; he still remembered his time as a mindless undead. Even so, he’d recovered eventually; his increased ability to heal should make that far faster. No matter his form, he would eventually put himself back together. 

The most likely loss, then, was a loss of time. He’d lose time with Rissa and Jenna and his parents. He’d lose time with all the friends he’d made since he came back. He’d known he was lonely as the Final Reaper; he’d never realized just how lonely Thomas was. That was a real threat, but one that might be worth it depending on how much his presence would help Gaia. He cared about her personally and as his planet, but that was minor next to his concern that this was all happening over A’Atla. People he cared about more than Gaia were in A’Atla.

“No,” Gaia admitted. “With your help, I can do something. Without it, I have no link to A’Atla; all I can do without you is deal with each wave as it comes and wait for it to pass. Perhaps I can restrict the power headed to A’Atla some and reduce the reflections, but there are many sea-lines that A’Atla has gathered to itself. There is only so much I can do without disturbing things too far elsewhere. A cascade would be bad.”

That made Serenity’s choice easy, really. “What do I need to do?”

“Serve as my anchor. Find a place for the node and hold it there. I expect you will need to build a dungeon and do it quickly; a dungeon is the perfect solution for wild energy. Be prepared, for it may be large.” 

Gaia’s suggestion of a dungeon caught Serenity off guard, but he could see where she was coming from; dungeons did a lot of things and many of them had to do with regulating a planet’s ley lines. He looked around again; he could still see the odd doubling that made Gaia’s core chamber and A’Atla overlap even though he knew they didn’t. 

He searched for the brightest point on A’Atla; that seemed like the most likely point to place a node. It was at the spire that emerged from the ground where Ea’s temple once was. “You said you didn’t want it at the spire, you wanted the node in the mountain?”

“Placing it at the spire would be a very bad idea,” Gaia agreed. “It’s bad enough that we have to place a permanent nexus on A’Atla at all. There will be consequences if A’Atla moves. I don’t want to have to balance every fluctuation in A’Atla’s mana consumption as well. Not directly, at least; that’s why we need a dungeon.”

The implication that the newly revealed spire was somehow connected to A’Atla’s power system wasn’t lost on Serenity, but realistically he had to be happy with what he knew. Gaia had told him she remembered very little about A’Atla; he was lucky she remembered that much.

The second brightest point on A’Atla was indeed inside the mountain of World Core crystal. He expected it to be near the base, but it was closer to a third of the way up the mountain. It wasn’t quite in the center horizontally, either, though it was close. Serenity fixed his attention on the spot. “I think I’m ready.”

Gaia didn’t say anything in return, but Serenity knew she’d heard by the sheer flood of mana that deluged him in that moment. He sort of pushed it towards the bright spot, which seemed to work; at least, the bright spot got brighter. He could feel that it was getting bigger, too, which should be fine. 

What wasn’t fine was how much of the energy was seeping away; almost as much as Gaia sent him. Serenity tried to hold it back, but it was like holding back the tide: simply impossible. He could hold a little and slow a little more down but he couldn’t stop or even slow all of it.

“That’s a good start. Keep it up,” Gaia encouraged Serenity right before she increased the amount of mana she sent him.

The task instantly went from “interesting” to “uncomfortable.” Serenity concentrated on the brightness he saw and on holding the mana there. All other thoughts vanished in his sheer focus to do what needed to be done. The discomfort, even pain, didn’t matter; he had to hold. That was all there was. He saw the point grow brighter and larger, but he didn’t think about what it meant. There wasn’t room in his mind for that. All he knew was to accept and hold on as best he could.

It grew brighter and brighter until suddenly Serenity wasn’t trying to hold on anymore; there was nothing to hold on to. Everything was mana and yet nothing was. Both mana and essence surrounded him. For a moment, it reminded him of the Origin.

For a moment, he was surprised he could be reminded of anything.

Then he heard a voice. No, a Voice. It wasn’t Order’s Voice, the one he’d heard so many times; it also wasn’t the Voice he heard sometimes during evolutions. It held elements of similarity to both but was somehow distinct.

[Emergency Dungeon establishment recognized]

[Please choose the Theme of your Dungeon so that construction can start immediately]

Serenity wanted to make another safe dungeon like the one he’d made on Tzintkra but he didn’t have to think hard on it to know that would be a bad idea. That dungeon had some issues; he strongly suspected it was only functional because it was disconnected from the local ley lines. This one was in a massive nexus. It needed monsters.

[Yes. A combat-heavy dungeon is recommended for all emergency dungeons]

Three things flashed through his mind. First, it was reading his mind. That wasn’t creepy at all. Second, it might not be reading his thoughts so much as listening; after all, it had to get commands somehow. Rissa would probably accuse him of projecting his thoughts. Third, the way it responded somehow seemed to indicate a personality.

[Hurry]

Yes, definitely a personality.

He should get on with it instead of thinking about the Voice. What Themes were even available? He’d never made a dungeon before. If only Raz were here.

Lillene

Poor Serenity, faced with a test he didn't study for...