The Newt and Demon - Book 8 Chapters 73,74,75

Chapter 73

Tempting Fate

Despite the warnings, Theo wanted Golem Hives in both his and Tresk’s throne rooms at the minimum. After observing the hive on Erradon for a while, he believed their power outweighed the risks. Although they didn’t have access to more of the alloy, they had plenty of powerful metal to create more hives. The alchemist started with his own realm, ensuring it was implanted with all the stipulations the one on Fenian’s planet had, before moving on to Tresk’s world.

Soon, both their realms were defended by the powerful golems. It was comforting thought, but Theo was reluctant to do the same thing for the mortal world.

“Ethics be damned!” Tresk shouted. She stood knee-deep in the mud of her own world, and it didn’t seem to bother her at all.

“Ethics have nothing to do with it,” Theo said. “I’m not putting a hive on the mortal plane, since I don’t know what’ll happen when I hit the big red reset button.”

“Okay, fine. But we should put at least one in Khahar’s world.”

Theo frowned at that idea. “I can already hear him in my head. He’s grumpy enough as it is, so I don’t want to stir the pot.”

“Why, because the idiot got himself stuck on Khahak?” Tresk asked, spitting into the mud. “That’s what I say. Homeboy bound himself too tightly to his world. He’s gotta live with the consequences.”

Theo rubbed his face, watching as a frog swam through the muddy water. “Remember, he did things in the order he did them for the sake of the world. The only way he could get the Thrones of Power to show up was by breaking the Ascendant system. And the only way to do that was to ascend.”

“Bah. Hate when you’re right…” Tresk pulled one foot from the mud, earning a squelching sucking sound for her efforts. “Ew. Anyway, what are we gonna do? I’m officially bored.”

Theo tapped his chin. “Well, let’s go over our list. We sorted the gods out.”

“Well, the Warriors of the Shard did that for us.”

“Uh-huh. And we fixed the energy so the system isn’t freaking out.”

Tresk shrugged, making a sound like a deflating balloon. “That was one of the most boring things we’ve done in recent memory.”

“We’re part-dragon. Maybe we can do something with that,” Theo suggested. “But I’ll remind you, everything we do should be something that makes it better on the other side.”

“Let’s see… I bet if we go to Pogo, she’ll have something cool for us to do,” Tresk said. “The Dragon Flights are weird, so maybe some organization will do them good.”

“We used the storm potion, and you think the dragons will do anything but go into their corners?” Theo asked. “Pogo was unaware of what the Storm Flight was doing, so I doubt they’ll work together without some serious prodding.”

“I got it,” Tresk said, snapping her fingers. “Something dangerous, and completely fun. Are you in?”

“You haven’t told me what we’re going to do, so naturally I don’t want to agree,” Theo said.

“Come on!”

Theo rolled his eyes, sensing her plan. It was stupid. “Okay. Let’s go.”

“Yeehaw!” Tresk shouted. “Hop on my back. Let’s go.”

Theo gave her a flat look.

“Metaphorically hop on my back. Don’t do it for real,” Tresk said, jerking her head to one side. “We’re leaving the kid here, don’t worry. Where we’re going, there’s not enough room.”

Theo metaphorically jumped on Tresk’s back, which meant that he allowed her to fold the void. A moment later, they were standing in pitch darkness. Of course, the marshling was quick to withdraw the extremely bright lantern from her inventory, illuminating the cave around them. The cavern was massive, with gray stone walls stretching as far as he could see.

Letting out a low whistle, Theo looked around. The energy in the surrounding rocks was strange. They were infused with a potent form of magic, but he couldn’t quite figure out what it was. “What kind of magic is that?”

Tresk rubbed her hands together. “Time magic. I think. Or space magic, maybe?”

Theo narrowed his eyes at the walls, taking in more of the energy. “Which realm are we in?”

“I dunno. It tastes like pennies, though,” Tresk said, getting on the ground and licking the floor. “Pennies and tar.”

Digging through Tresk’s memories, Theo figured out where they were. He didn’t know the name of the realm, but it rested in a graveyard of similar realms. This was one of the old godly realms, but not one from his time. It was far older than that. It was something the people from the old world would call and Elderling realm, which the alchemist took to mean was a realm of great power. Death’s realm fell into that category.

“Why did you bring us to the caves, though?” Theo asked. “Doesn’t this place have a throne room?”

Tresk shrugged. “Maybe it does, but I can’t find it.”

Tresk might’ve brought them there, but now it was up to Theo to figure out exactly where they were. He started with their immediate area, taking readings of the latent magic in the walls. For the first time, he could claim he was getting quite good at it. If the magic was related to concepts of time, he couldn’t even guess. But as a man who regularly bent space to his will, he could agree that they were infused with space-related magic with a hint of dimensionality.

Theo folded the void, bringing them to a spot that radiated power within the world. The pair appeared in a spartan room with a stone throne on the far end. The walls were made from hewn stone, and the floor matched. It was almost completely bare, with only the throne, a small banner behind it, and a few tables scattered around the area.

“Woah, how did you find it?” Tresk asked.

“I looked,” Theo said, approaching the throne. He placed his hand on the surface, and while he half-expected a system prompt to appear, nothing came. “I suppose we can make a potion from the throne and see what happens. But, tell me the truth. Are you trying to go back in time? Maybe forward in time?”

Tresk offered a heavy shrug. “I don’t know! I just thought this magic would be pretty rare, so we should check it out.”

With no interest in going on a time-traveling adventure, Theo took caution. He studied the room and the energies that flowed through it before he gained some understanding of the place. He determined it was older than the Elderling realms, and completely unused. The other realms he had investigated, those of the fallen Ascendants, had a thread of something interesting attached to them. There was a clear connection to anyone who had ever sat upon those thrones. But this one was bare.

It shouldn’t have been a surprise when a familiar voice squeaked out within the room.

“Nope!” Fate called, rushing over in a huff. “This is the worst one!”

Theo gave her a confused look, turning to find the young elf in a floral-pattern dress. She had her hair up in two buns and a very annoyed look on her face. “The worst one of what?”

Fate sighed, reaching into the air and plucking at nothing. She drew it toward her, revealing a glittering golden thread suspended in mid-air. “The worst fate. I’ve kept a close eye on this one for a while, and you’re finally here.”

“Make the potion, Theo,” Tresk said, rubbing her hands together. “Let’s tempt fate.”

Fate shot daggers at Tresk before huffing again. “In the future where you mess with this realm, things go sideways. Do you know how the gods work out in the wider universe?”

“Not a clue,” Theo said.

“Here’s the quick version: they have tiers. In any sector, you can have Billy, the god of crochet. He’s really low on the tier list. You can also have a local god of death.”

“Francis,” Tresk said. “Francis, the God of Death.”

“Yeah, sure. Francis would be higher up, but he still isn’t at the top,” Fate said. “There are gods who have influence over both universes. They are at the top of the top. And if you gain their attention… Well, I’ve seen the future. It isn’t good.”

Theo weighed his options. They were really only there to sate Tresk’s curiosity. If the marshling got what she wanted, they wouldn’t even need to make the potion. “What kind of calamity are we talking about? World-ending?”

“Sector-ending,” Fate corrected. “There’s a primordial god out there that watches time itself. I observe fates, which can go into the future, but this lady watches all of time. Have you ever seen a Time Mage?”

Theo shared a look with Tresk. They both said, “No.”

“Because she kills them or steers them off that path before they become Time Mages,” Fate said. She pulled the golden thread tighter, revealing that it was dissolving in her hands. “The fact that we’re still talking means that you don’t intend to make that potion, which is great. I’ve spoken to this time god before, and that is just some heat we don’t need in the sector.”

Theo tapped his chin, going over a few things Fate had said. “Wait. Two universes?”

“Ugh. Why do I have to explain everything?” Fate asked. “Yes. The God of Time split the universe into two to correct for an error. We’ve only had one breach in our space-time bubble, but we’ll see some more once the barrier drops. Now, are you two going to promise not to mess with time?”

Theo looked around at the throne room. He imagined it was a place where an Ascendant planned to screw with time. Perhaps this God of Time had swooped in, destroying them before they could go through with it. “We should collapse the realm,” he said after a long pause. “We should actually do that for a lot of the realms out here. Is that something the gods can help me with?”

Fate tilted her head to one side, as though considering the option. “Well… We’re supposed to work with the throne-people… But everyone is so busy.”

“Why aren’t you busy?” Theo asked.

“Only two heavenly realms passed the test,” Fate said, puffing with pride. “Fate, Omen, and Hallow.”

Theo barked a laugh. “The pacifist passed the test? Okay, now I’m interested.”

Fate giggled. “He had siphoned all his energy into a massive army. But he refused to kill anyone, and ended up taking all of the Warriors of the Shard that attacked him prisoner. Meya was very pleased.”

“What about you and your brother?” Tresk asked.

Fate laughed again. “We saw them coming. So, we just left our realm empty. There’s no way anyone in the Warriors wants to sit on a throne for the rest of their life, so they gave up.”

“I guess that’s one way to do it…” Theo trailed off. He really wanted to destroy these dangerous realms. The system might recycle them during the reset, but then again, what had the system done that gave confidence to that idea? Some things fell to the Throne Holders and the Gods. “Let’s go get Hallow. These realms have gotta go.”

Fate considered the offer for a moment, before eventually shrugging. “No need. Omen and I have enough power to help, and we’re the only ones that can leave the heavens without special permission. My brother won’t be happy about it, but he’ll lend his destructive power to the cause!”

Chapter 74

Solid Pies

The amount of unused realms in the sector was insane. Theo’s senses, mighty as they might be, couldn’t grasp the amount of worlds resting just under the surface of the void. He stood in his bubble with Tresk, Omen, and Fate, observing those many worlds with his mouth wide open. The power of the two gods, apparently the only two that could break the confines of the heavens without a mountain of paperwork, had given their power to reveal the endless sprawl of realms.

The energy was intoxicating, making the alchemist’s head swim.

“This is an exceptionally bad plan,” Omen said. It was only the tenth time he objected to the plan.

“Oh, don’t be so glum,” Fate said, punching her brother in the arm. “I’ve read the threads. This is a good outcome.”

Omen folded his arms, and Theo felt for him at that moment. The boy could only see disaster. Unlike his sister, the ‘threads’ he saw were nothing more than the end-result of some horrific event. It seemed that over the years, he developed faith in Fate’s ability to sniff out the bad threads from the good ones. Together, their divine powers were equally confusing and impressive.

“So how do we do this?” Tresk asked. She seemed to be the least likely to embark on a realm-destroying mission.

“First we need to sort through the worlds,” Fate said, cupping her chin in her hand and humming. “Some might still be useful.”

“And some might be super dangerous,” Theo said. “Like the time world.”

“Exactly.” Fate pointed to a few dots in the distance. “We don’t want to touch those.”

With Fate’s first steps declared, the group got to work. It wasn’t enough for her to point out the realms. She wanted to visit them one by one before declaring that it was safe to destroy them. In that regard, Omen was incredibly helpful. His sense of danger was absolute, meaning that if somebody were to even propose destroying the planet, he would get visions of the things that would happen afterward. At first, Theo felt awkward working with the gods, but as more time went on, he realized that these two were likely his favorite, even when compared to Hallow.

It was devilishly hard to tell how much time had passed since they started the efforts, but with several hundred realms marked, the group began the next phase of the process. It wasn’t anything Theo was unfamiliar with, but the specific application of these void-based energies felt alien. They all had to wrap their collective will and intent around the world and then compress it down until it became nothing. Their first attempts were sluggish at best, but eventually, everybody got a handle on the concept of working together, and the first realm drifting in the void was destroyed.

Yet it left something behind.

Hovering in the darkness of the void, a black marble caught the light of the fake sun. Theo approached it, reaching his hand through the bubble and grasping it. He turned his head back to Fate to confirm what he was doing was all above board, and she nodded and then laughed.  

“I will not punish you for taking advantage of your hard work,” she said. “The threads of fate are clear. I know exactly what you’re going to do with that thing.”

“Would you mind giving me some spoilers?” Theo asked with a smile.  

“Think of it as ultra-condensed energy. This might be useful if you had a way of processing it into energy that would be useful to you, but you don’t.”

Except, Theo could think of a few good uses for an absurd amount of energy. Khahar’s problem with his realm was one of those things, and there might have been a plan forming in his head to take advantage of the hundred-odd worlds they would compress today. Khahar might’ve been sneaky with his plans, but he was still part of the sector’s grander plan. Right now, more than anything, they needed another Throne Holder to keep the sector together.

Fate pulled at a thread in the air. It went tight, and the origin was revealed to be Theo’s chest. “See? He’s already got it. Anyway, back to work.”

Of course, the only thing Theo could think of after that point was exactly how he was going to pull the plan off. That was fine since the work they were doing was monotonous at best. They collapsed entire realms, turning all the condensed energy that had been collected over years into a marble. The alchemists would then pocket them, as each refused to enter his inventory. The work was exhausting, leading to both Theo and Tresk flagging about halfway through the endeavor. But Fate and Omen never slowed down for even a moment. They worked as though their life depended on it, which the alchemist realized might have actually been the case.

When Theo and Tresk could no longer go on, fate called it a day. Although she claimed to be impressed with their stamina, the alchemists suspected she was disappointed they didn’t get the job done in one day. But even the power of the two gods wasn’t enough to collapse the realm. There had to be a combination of energies between throne holders and gods to make it happen. And yet, the invitation at the end of the ordeal was extremely welcome.

“Perhaps the two of you can come back to our realm. We don’t have anything fancy, but the scenery is very pleasant and... I’ve been working on a pie recipe.” Fate looked almost giddy to share her baking, and Theo would only be lying to himself if he declined the invitation.

“I like pie,” Tresk said. 

“She finally got it so it doesn’t slosh as much,” Omen said with a chuckle.

The group took their leave from the void. Of course, Fate and Omen simply vanished from the spot, forcing Theo and Tresk to make their way to the system’s center. The alchemist was certain they could break into the heavens, but with the system feeling more like herself by the day, he figured she would grant them some leeway, and he was right.

“Well, the seal is entirely shattered right now,” the system said, her voice carrying a tone of optimism rather than ravenous insanity. “I would have poked a hole in it for you, though. Since you’re destroying the disused realms, I have even more energy.” 

“Great to hear!” Tresk said, pumping her fist in the air. “Does that mean we have more time?”

“If you need it,” the system said, inclining her head toward the marshling.

It was a good-news kind of day. Theo shared a few more thoughts with the system before making his way to the far side of the platform. He then entered the void and found it incredibly easy to locate the realm of the twins. When he entered, they did so in a mossy forest. It was a redwood forest that stretched in every direction. Only the calling voice of fate far in the distance gave him any bearing to his location.

“I can see why people would have trouble attacking this place,” Theo said. “I don’t see any landmarks or anything interesting. And when I extend my senses, I can barely feel anything. They’ve done a great job in shielding this world.” 

“Best of all: I smell pie!” Tresk shouted, running off ahead.

Theo jogged behind her as the scent of the pie grew stronger with each stride. They eventually came to a clearing where two thrones sat on a plain stone platform. The clearing was extremely simple, featuring only a wood-burning oven, a table, and a few chairs scattered around. The moss here was well-packed, with the clearing above giving a view of the sky. Wood smoke and the scent of pie lingered in the air.

Both Fate and Omen looked a bit too excited.

“Just about done,” Fate said, withdrawing a steaming pie from the oven with what looked like handmade oven mitts. “Well, we have to let it cool.”

“So, you guys really live in the forest?” Tresk asked, looking around. “Where do you sleep?”

“We don’t,” Omen said with a shrug. “We’re gods.”

“Oh. Right. You’re too chill. Forgot about the whole god thing,” Tresk said. “Anyway, you guys let your pie cool? I like it when it burns my throat.”

***

Chimeras and years. Counting both had become the only thing he could think of. A loss of identity was to be expected, but the cloud that flooded through his mind was an absolute thing. Perhaps it was borne of some need to shield himself from the endless world, or to pad the unpalatable passage of time with something more familiar. The only thing that drew him from that long battle haze was the light that lingered on the horizon. It shone like a beacon, flashing out as though it shone only for him.

Fenian shook his head, swallowing hard as he looked down at himself. He was beyond bedraggled, his finely made outfit worn down until it was only rags. Caked from head to toe in muck and blood, he finally snapped out of it. But he had been counting all along, keeping the tally not in his head but on the handle of his sword. The hash marks wrapped around in the thousands, presenting a confusing tapestry. To center himself, he counted them.

“At least a thousand years,” Fenian said, clearing his throat and rolling his shoulders as he disrobed. He produced a fresh outfit from his inventory, including a new hat, before getting dressed. “Not quite the entrance I intended to make, but this will have to do.”

The gains he had made during his journey were downright frightening. Fenian didn’t want to consider what it meant to be above Level 100. If this were the old world, he wondered if he would’ve been tempted to create his own realm and ascend. But to push beyond that, almost hitting Level 500 in a relatively short time revealed how much fighting he had done.

That wasn’t even to talk about the celestial energy he had gathered.

Fenian held his sword in his hand, feeling the unfamiliar strength of too many levels and too much energy sting his muscles. He gave it a test swing and watched as the force of the swing itself shattered the landscape before him. The blade, once a tool of an elven god, now sang with the energy of something greater.

“Well, that’s an improvement,” Fenian said.

Coiling on the spot, the elf shot forward over the desolation of Kuzan’s hell, barreling toward the light. If he had his senses about him during his haze, he would’ve made much better time. But the gains were worth it. Maybe.

Fenian landed at the base of a familiar tower. He shook his head, unable to deny how on-the-nose the construction was. The bone-white marble created a perfect tower nestled within unforgiving territory. The light hadn’t even been spilling from the top, but rather within the first floor. Like the towers the Shards occupied, this one held a powerful light that flooded out and urged people to come forward. Unlike the Shards, this light was meant for only one person.

Reluctant as he was to see if the plan had worked, Fenian took his first step into the tower. The light washed over him, some of that scent he remembered from the old days flooding his nostrils. It had been a longshot. The way Leon operated Death’s Gate was one of absorption. He sucked in all the souls, regardless of who they were or where they came from. When Death’s Gate malfunctioned, spitting some souls into the void to languish, he had feared the worst.

But the Lady’s grace was absolute.

“Tinesa,” Fenian said, reaching out to touch the light. His fingers graced the edge of her soul, filling him with a wave of complete comfort. “Took me a while. But I’m here, as promised.”

The plan was imperfect. Fenian hadn’t found the other souls he was looking for. They were simply too deep. Since he had to solve the problem of break a soul out of Death’s Gate, there might’ve still been time to find those other souls.

Fenian stretched out, withdrawing the idol from his inventory. “I was never a fan of necromancy.”

Chapter 75

Nukes

Sarisa shifted uncomfortably on the spot. The metropolis world of Khahak wasn’t appealing to most people that had barely left their home town, which just so happened to be a tiny swamp town. Most people from Broken Tusk would feel like a fish out of water when placed in such a scenario. But Theo thought it was important to perform some experiments. Of all the people in town, she had actually visited the Middle Realms more than most. This put her in a unique position, something equating to exposure therapy with the higher realms.

"You don't have a job, right?” Sarisa asked, arms folded as she scooted away from a passing group on the busy streets. She looked up at the dizzying heights of the arbiter's citadel and shook her head. A moment later, her red-brown skin went a shade of green. “Buildings shouldn't be that tall.”

"Now, are you feeling sick because of vertigo or from exposure to the energy here?" Theo asked, tilting his head as he studied her. "Let me know if you get any headaches, joint aches, a runny nose, or perhaps congestion in general."

"Are those the side effects of being exposed to the middle realms?" Tresk asked.

"No, but you never know when they'll develop. Anyway, I thought we would take the long way to the Citadel, you know, taking in the sights, enjoying the sounds…”

“And the smells," Tresk said, sniffing the air. "I don't know what that guy's cooking, but I want some of it."

Before making their way to the Citadel proper, the group stopped for some food. There were plenty of street vendors hawking their wares, and a lot of the food here was monster meat. There was some value in eating that kind of meat. Theo understood that, depending on the quality of the monster, the energy inside would be more dense or something. He didn't really know how it was supposed to work in this world, and at this point he was afraid to ask.

The first floor of the Citadel was as intimidating as the image it struck across the skyline. People were bustling, with administrators and officials moving about with the efficiency of their station. Off to the side was the elevator, which was currently packed. Theo considered for only a moment breaking his promise to himself to move through normal means. Eventually, the trio got in line to take the magical elevator, as it was incredibly efficient. It didn't take long for it to be their turn, and they were soon zooming up to the top floor. Of course, Sarisa threw up, much to the dismay of the other passengers, but after that, she was feeling much better.

"I really don't feel the realm's effects as much this time," Sarisa said, stretching out as they stepped onto the top floor of the Citadel. "Maybe you're right. Maybe this exposure stuff is actually working."  

“That might be the case,” Theo conceded. "More than likely you have an amount of tolerance, but I don't understand the mechanics specifically. Initially, I thought it was that your soul was bound to the mortal plane, which meant that you were deprived of an intrinsic energy source, but lately I've been leaning towards the idea that the more potent energies here are the thing poisoning you."  

"I'm being poisoned?" Sarisa asked, looking around indignantly. "So your grand experiment is to slowly poison me until I build up a tolerance? Actually, that checks out. I’ve got a scorpion if anyone wants a quick sting.”

“Oh, me!” Tresk said, holding up her hand. 

Theo was subjected to the scene of his companions allowing themselves to be stung by a scorpion in the hallowed halls of the Arbiter. He waited until his desire to linger expired, then urged both of them down the hall. Of course, the Arbiter’s Citadel was a lavished thing. There wasn’t a wall without a fresco, painting, or other adornment that marked it as an important thing in a building of important things. Eventually, he knocked on the massive double doors.

“Well, I didn’t expect you to use the correct entrance to my office,” Khahar said, the door swinging open with his words. “What a lovely change of pace.”

“We’re busting you out, buddy!” Tresk shouted, pumping her fists and giving nothing in particular the finger. “Screw you system! We’re springing my boy!”

Khahar blinked, watching as the group approached. “As much as I appreciate the sentiment, what is a mortal doing here?”

“Experiments,” Theo said, shaking his head. “Just pretend she isn’t here.”

“Wow,” Sarisa said. “Thanks.”

“What brings you to the citadel?” Khahar asked. “I’m afraid I need more information than you guys breaking me out.”

"The answer to that question is the answer to the previous question," Theo said, pointing his finger in the air, like the nerd he was. “Experiments. I've recently come into possession of an obscene amount of aligned energy, and I wanted to run some experiments on your realm."

Khahar offered him a quizzical look, as though he doubted every word the alchemist said. "You're going to experiment on my realm?" he asked, scratching his chin as though he couldn't fathom what was happening. "And what exactly does that entail?" 

Theo rolled his shoulders and took a deep breath. “The problem with your realm is that you have a pseudo Ascendant Realm. You took a realm and bound it to the Throne of the Arbiter. The problem there is that your throne already has a realm, so you mixed two realms. Not to toot my own horn, but we actually have experience with this.”

“You see,” Tresk said, pushing up a non-existent pair of glasses. “We mixed the concepts of the Dream Realm with actualized concepts of the Throne Realm. The difference is that the Dream Realm was a sentient, maybe sapient, thing. She reformed herself around the Throne of the Dreamwalker, creating a new version of Tero’gal. But we had to split the realm generated by the Throne of the Dreamer into a moon, otherwise the concepts couldn’t exist together.”

“Which means,” Theo continued. “We need to split your realms like an atom.”

Khahar blinked a few times. “Theo, you know what happens when you split an atom, right?”

“Kaboom!” Tresk shouted, throwing her hands into the air. “Yeah, things go boom. But we’re going to control the split with all this fancy energy we found. No one was using it. We just found it. Don’t ask questions.”

“How does the mortal play into this?” Khahar asked suspiciously.

“Inside you, there are three wolves,” Tresk explained. “Throne, middle, and mortal.”

“So we’re going to split those parts into distinct things, and reforge your soul,” Theo said. “Right now, Khahar, as a soul, is attached to his mortal body, the Throne of the Arbiter, and the combined Throneworld of the Arbiter and the Realm known as Khahak. So, we’ll remove that attachment, make a moon, and bingo, bango, bongo, you’re all good.”

Khahar leveled his gaze at Theo, narrowing his eyes. “This idea is very idiotic.”

“Sorry, buddy. You have a job,” Tresk said. “As much as you wanna languish here in your perfect city, you need to help. Yeah, maybe you can travel to the other Middle Realms, or even go to the heavens. But I bet you start feeling like this poor sick puppy after a while.”

“Because you’re not using your Arbiter’s Core like you should,” Theo said.

“You two… are very annoying,” Khahar said, jabbing a finger between Theo and Tresk. “One of you can talk. You know that, right? It doesn’t have to be a back and forth ordeal.”

“Why,” Theo started.

“Not?” Tresk finished.

Khahar let out an exasperated sigh. “You’re not going to leave this alone, are you?”

“Nope. And, we need you to get a better name for your moon. If you call it Khahap or some crap like that, I’m gonna riot,” Tresk said, folding her arms. “Now, make yourself ready. This will hurt.”

“Wait!” Khahar shouted. Almost all of his collected personality faded in an instant. “Do you guys even know what you’re doing?”

“Duh,” Tresk said. “We’ve done this before.”

“Just hold still,” Theo said, holding his hands out. “This will hurt. A lot.”

Sarisa scampered to the corner of the room, hands over her face as she whimpered. Tresk held the marble of a world in her hand, ready to start her part. Theo wasn’t sure if they needed to merge to make this happen, but he was certain they could split Khahar’s soul, and instigate a migration of the Throne of the Arbiter in the same breath. It was mostly a matter of taking his soul out of the equation, and letting the world do the rest. Once Khahak got its sense as an entity back, everything else would come naturally. The excess energy would just help things along.

Theo’s aura flashed out without warning, washing over Khahar. He was screaming right away, the insane power held within his soul released as a blast of energy. Tresk held up the marble of power, pinching it between her fingers. It shattered, releasing excess energy with an alignment close enough to Khahar’s own concepts. She withdrew five more, repeating the process as the Arbiter writhed on the ground.

“You good, Sarisa?” Theo asked, looking back as he controlled his aura.

“No! I wanna go home!” she shouted back.

“Almost done,” Theo said, turning back to set his focus on Khahar once again. “Feels like the world is responding, right?”

Tresk nodded, pointing toward the Throne of the Arbiter. “Yep. She’s splitting apart. The conceptual integrity of the planet feels good, too.”

“His soul just doesn’t want to peel away,” Theo said. “Just let go of what you were, Khahar.”

“I cannot!” Khahar shouted back.

Theo doubled the power of his aura, infusing it with every last drop of the Reforge Soul concept he could muster. “This isn’t an option,” he said. “Remember, you’ve got a job to do.”

Khahar buckled under the weight of Theo’s aura. As much as he wanted to fight back against the tide, there was a point where even his stubborn personality would bend. That point came when the world split, the Throne of the Arbiter fading away in a blink. Khahak, as an entity, gained recognition in a flash. The world rumbled as it sorted through whatever energy held it together. Although he couldn’t see it, he was certain the Throne of the Arbiter had been shot into space around the planet, forming a symbiotic moon.

Once the planet released its connection with the throne, Khahar’s soul was next. Flames erupted from his skin, creating a shroud of heat intense enough to melt the stone beneath him. The impure energies of a false god melted away with the stone as the mortal ties that made the beating heart of every Throne Holder returned. A flash of energy shot out from his body, and Theo was almost too late in creating the barriers around him. If not for his danger sense, the alchemist would’ve surely seen that nuclear explosion he had been promised.

In an instant, the room went from a rush of ominous sounds to absolute silence. Only the ragged breathing of Khahar was heard, punctuated here and there with the frightened whimpering of Sarisa.

“Everyone got all their limbs? Everyone still has their eyebrows?” Theo asked.

“I never had them to begin with,” Tresk said with a shrug. She scampered over to the window, pointing upward. “Look! A baby moon!”

“It's a boy!” Theo shouted. “Congratulations, Khahar!”

“I hate you both,” Khahar said, coughing and rolling around on the ground. “I’ve never experienced such pain.”

“Can I go home, now!?” Sarisa shouted frantically from the side of the room.

Theo smiled, approaching the woman and giving her a once-over with his senses. She had absorbed an amount of the potent energy they had released, meaning her body had enough of the ‘poison’ to process for a while. With a wave of his hand, he sent her back home. He had all the information he needed to make an assessment.

“Well, how about we go have a look at your new moon,” Theo said. “Then we can test the reforging. It happened a lot quicker than most, so you should feel lucky.”

Khahar finally rose to his feet, his fur matted in some places and burned in others. “Oh, I just feel so lucky. With friends like you, who needs nukes?”