His page in the Library of Fate pulsed with an insistent demand for attention, but for now, Ori ignored it. After the battle of wills with the devil, he had taken minor damage to the spiritual fabric of his mind, made worse by the backlash when his domain collapsed. A dull, throbbing headache sat behind his eyes, making thought feel slow and heavy.
“Oh, you’re finally awake,” Freya said.
Ori tracked her voice. She sat on a tree stump beside his head. A stir of pink drew his attention as Ruenne’del snuggled closer on his other side, while Tess lay curled into him, her soft snores suggesting she was deep within the land of dreams.
“What happened?” Ori asked, groggy, lifting his head a fraction to take stock. “And where are we?”
“We’re still in Stablemere Ford. We got you out of the pit, but we’re still in the village.”
“We are?” Ori grunted as he raised his head again. The last seconds of consciousness from last night returned in fragments: Lightfield, the cleansing spell, the intention to heal all of those harmed here, including the land itself.
Tall grass surrounded him, blocking most of the view of what had been the town. As Ori gently worked himself free of Ruenne’del’s hold, he could make out the valley’s shape. Where burned mud and bodies had littered the floodplain, foot-long grass now blanketed the ground like a verdant carpet.
He had not been sure how much of his intention had been deliberate during the moment, but with his Cosmic affinity lending permanence, the spell had apparently lasted through the night.
“What about the villagers?” Ori asked.
“Most are back on their feet,” Freya said. “They were frightened by the Peritia storm and the lights at first, but when they saw the grass grow, and the oppressive feeling from the tormented souls lift… some have already started rebuilding, or at least making camp. We rotated watch while you were out. Ayame’s out there now. She set wards around us and the pit, then went to help forage.”
Seraphine’s Beacon manifested on Ori’s lap, glowing with its warm light. “Ori, what happened?” Seraphine asked. “Tess and Ayame nearly floated away like soap bubbles after that tide of Peritia swept over us. I’ve never seen anything like it, I’ve never even heard of anything like it.”
“Something like that happened when you killed the fallen god, Tekrakathune,” Freya said. “You were mortal then, so Fate rewarded the feat heavily. For it to happen again suggests you defeated another powerful foe?”
“There was an army,” Ori sighed. “Thousands of greater demons, led by an infernal devil at, I think, Pinnacle Rank. With at least one racial evolution, plenty of Grace, or whatever the infernal equivalent is, and an elite force behind it. It was something the current me should not have been able to face.” His eyes closed for a moment. “We were lucky.”
“You killed them all?” Seraphine asked, her voice soft and careful, the unspoken question of how hanging in the air.
“I did. Not a single atom or wisp of soul from that army exists anywhere in Fate or outside it.”
“How?” Freya asked.
Ori shook his head. “It was a theory. In artificial spaces, like void storage rings, the creator can define constants and dimensions. The affinity of the space, and other values, no one really understands. There’s one value that’s usually set at random, at the enchanter’s whim, and it does nothing except exist. Normally, changing it after the enchantment is set would break the whole thing.”
He swallowed, then continued. “In the soul garden, not only did I have my suspicions as to what that value represented, I also showed my mentor a way to change that value without collapsing the space. It was a theoretical exercise at the time with no way to test it.”
“I don’t understand,” Freya said, voice incredulous. “You’re saying you changed something in the gate enchantments, and it killed the army?”
“They were waiting inside a pocket space between planes,” Ori said. “Before the gate on this side could open, I altered the value for the lowest possible energy state in that space. In my world, there’s a theory called false vacuum decay.” He exhaled. “Basically, that effect wiped away everything inside.”
Ori sank back into the grass and stared up at the drifting clouds, leaving Lightfield remaining for now. Over the bond, he felt Ruenne’del stir, then settle again, pretending to remain asleep. Freya and Seraphine remained silent as they came to terms with his explanation, as he finally turned his attention to his accolades and altered traits.
High Redeemer had become Arch Redeemer, while both his Lesser Terraformer and Mortal Enchanter entries had disappeared, having been folded into a new unique accolade titled Wandsmith.
While his class traits remained, others had merged with new traits from both accolades now littering the bottom portion of his page.
Accolade: Arch Redeemer
Type: Unique, Significant, Combat, Evolving, Titled, Ability, Trait, Class, Entity
Legend: As named by the Library of Fates, Arch Redeemer is a unique, titled accolade bestowed upon one whose power and inclinations lie not only in defeating demons, but in redeeming infernal souls.
Evolving from Demon Bane, the accolade first manifested after the recipient redeemed a powerful infernal soul, severing its infernal bonds and purifying the corruption that bound it. It later deepened with the destruction of Ghigrerchiax, an infernal prison complex and operational nexus, after the evacuation of its prisoners. By exploiting interdimensional gate infrastructure and external mana sources, the recipient collapsed the stronghold in a cataclysmic detonation, annihilating its forces and dismantling the physical and metaphysical systems that enabled its atrocities, including the elimination of a peak Sovereign-ranked lesser devil.
Later, after further victories against infernals across southern Twilight, the recipient raised a mortal champion, empowering them and their allies to eradicate an infernal nest led by a Immortal-ranked devil. In the aftermath, under imminent risk of ambush by a significant invasion force, the recipient neutralised a demon-gate trap left behind. This act erased an assembled invasion force within an infernal staging space thus preventing an incursion into Twilight. The site was then sanctified: bound souls were released and lingering infernal taint cleansed. These cumulative acts elevated High Redeemer into Arch Redeemer, reflecting sustained suppression and redemption of infernal influence at a scale recognised by Fate.
Due to the uniqueness of this accolade and the benefits Fate has bestowed through its legend, the Library of Fates now recognises Arch Redeemer as an Entity. This recognition unlocks unique class options upon reaching upgrade milestones for the class: White Mage.
Traits:
Infernal Blood Sense: Instinctively sense those with an infernal pact wherever they are within your perception. Merged with Vision of the Progenitor.
Infernal Redeemer: Infernal beings at your rank or lower can no longer harm you and instinctively recognise this. Additionally increases the likelihood of purifying or redeeming living infernal entities through soulcraft and through severance of infernal bonds.
Architect of Ruin and Redemption: You are recognised by entities attuned to destruction, redemption, change, elemental and harmonic forces. Such beings may acknowledge your capability, seek your guidance, or fear your potential, while others may attempt to bargain, demand your presence for mediation, or seek redemption from you directly.
Redeemer’s Grace: Bonds, allies, and those under your instruction gain Grace at a significantly increased rate. This rate increases further while fighting infernal foes.
Accolade: Wandsmith
Type: Unique, Significant, Enchanting, Evolving, Titled, Trait
Legend: As named by the Library of Fates, Wandsmith is a unique, titled accolade bestowed upon those whose enchanting consistently exceeds the limits of rank, resources, and convention, and whose craft alters the battlefield or the rules by which such battles are fought.
It was first recognised when the recipient, still mortal, repeatedly produced high-level enchanting at an exceptional rate and standard, rare across Fate. This includes the soul-binding and reforging of an Immortal-ranked artefact later named Seraphine’s Beacon, refinement of defensive wards, creation of specialised tools for enchantment-breaking and utility, iterative development of channelling wands, the awakening of a wand spirit, and the mid-battle crafting of a soul-rending enchantment used to defeat a Sovereign-ranked foe in single combat.
Shortly after awakening, the Wandsmith annihilated Ghigrerchiax by re-enchanting interdimensional mana sources, collapsing a mountain and obliterating a multidimensional infernal operation, severing Twilight from its largest infernal gateway.
After raising a mortal champion, in part by empowering them with a Pinnacle-ranked artefact set, the champion and their allies eradicated an infernal nest led by a Immortal-ranked devil. When the infernal counter-attack followed, the Wandsmith turned tools and traps back upon their creators, rewriting the laws of an infernal staging area and erasing the ambush force within, from Fate.
Due to the uniqueness of this accolade and the benefits Fate has bestowed through its legend, the Library of Fates now recognises Wandsmith as an Entity. This recognition unlocks unique class traits and enhancements for the class: Wandsmith.
Traits:
Lawcraft: Laws expressed through your work can be translated between media. A law derived from an enchantment’s effect may be woven into a spell of High Magic or greater. A law derived from a spell may be inscribed into an enchantment at the moment of inscription.
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Greater Wandsmith: Your wand proficiency exceeds your peers. Wands, foci, and channelling tools you use are four times as effective for casting and related abilities. In your presence, hostile wand wielders suffer reduced channelling through their tools, halving the effectiveness of wand-mediated effects reduced, unless overcome by vastly superior rank, will, or item quality.
There was one small addition amid the raft of changes on his page: a notice from Fate. Whether it was crossing some threshold of Peritia, killing a certain number or rank of enemies, or the fact that he was now an Entity of Power six times over, Ori had now unlocked access to an escrow market system run by the Library of Fate.
Thraxis had promised him access to such a system, along with royalties in the form of currency he could spend within it, if he repeated the method of High Human evolution five times. Having access now was both good and bad. Good, because Ori could finally attempt to negotiate his rewards. Bad, because the conversion ratio from Peritia to credits was ruinously expensive: over a million Peritia per credit. With the cheapest items, mostly rare raw materials, priced at twenty to thirty credits, Ori’s glut of Peritia no longer felt so large.
Worse, almost nothing on offer was familiar, beyond a few crafting materials he was actually tempted to buy for the equivalent of nearly a billion Peritia.
And there was Quinessence. Several nuggets, in fact: chunks less than thumb-sized, yet worth ten times more in credits than Ori could convert with his entire stockpile of over twelve point nine billion Peritia.
Ori sighed. He decided to keep an eye on the market, while mentally earmarking ten billion of his Peritia as contingency, specifically for his scheduled battle with the Name Eater, and a paradoxically more urgent problem.
Curse: Graceless Infernal Deathclock
Rank: Divine
Description: This curse feeds upon the grace you accumulate.
Notes: You have [5,275 days, 3 hours and 7 minutes] of life remaining.
Ori should’ve felt ecstatic when he realised he had more than sixteen years left to live. However, the curse’s sudden extension brought a new awareness with it. What might once have been too faint to notice was now unmistakable. The curse’s complexity and its insidious nature had become clear. It consumed the Grace he accumulated, and only now did Ori understand to what end.
It seemed that bastard of a dead god was feeding on Ori’s Grace in order to resurrect himself. Ori suspected that the moment he fully revealed himself to the public and received the Grace such renown would likely generate, Tekrakathune would be reborn, and whether he would survive that process was less than doubtful. Now he had no choice but to take the situation far more seriously and urgently. Even so, he was already forming a plan, one that would, in true Ori fashion, turn the tools of his oppressors back against them if he had any say in the matter.
He gripped Seraphine’s beacon and felt how much more familiar it had become. The Wandsmith and Greater Wandsmith traits were clearly stacking, multiplying together to push his proficiency with wands to astronomical levels. That, more than anything, gave him confidence in the future. The Name Eater, the Deathclock, even the cartels behind Martel Wheeler’s demise, he would find a way not only to overcome them, but to thrive while doing so.
Despite being an Entity of Power six times over, his immediate priorities had not changed. First, he needed a plan to rescue Merin and her family. Then he would craft what he needed to pull it off, including his new Du?list’s array and the Avatar hinted at by Caoimhe’s enchantments.
After Merin’s rescue, perhaps he would spend a few weeks tinkering before his deadline with Fate and the Name Eater.
However, before any of that could take place, a certain infernal gateway still needed careful dismantling and putting away.
“Here it is.” Ori sighed to himself, finally finding the braided ivory cord that almost killed him and his bonds. After focusing so much of his attention on sigil connections and the complex nest of enchantments, Ori had finally this single, innocuous, unenchanted cord of bone that had triggered the trap.
After reviewing his new traits and accolades, Ori had returned to the pit. It was now covered with grass just like much of the valley with most of the slabs of plate that formed the artefact hidden underneath the recent growth. In the following hour, Ori had methodically gone through each and every part of the grand artefact, building an increasingly thorough understanding of the demon gate and the trap that activated it. In the light of day and with most of the pressure and anxiety behind him, Ori had decided to take his time systematically dismantling the artefact as he worked through and understood the function of each component. Knowing he would almost certainly experiment with, and eventually rebuild this gate from scratch, Ori now came to understand the nature of Ruenne’del’s gift to him.
Beyond the Peritia, the accolades, this artefact, and the raft of new enchantments within would accelerate his understanding of gateways and his craft by decades. In addition, Ayame’s help, someone whose feather-light nudging by Ruenne’del had brought into his life at precisely the right time, couldn’t be ignored.
She, along with Tess, had received enough Peritia to not only awaken but level up into the peak of Nascent rank, just like him. For some reason, despite Fate’s insistent calls, they had both refused to awaken for now, which, while Ori knew the reasons for in Tess’s case, he was as yet unsure to the reason for the fox womans delay in awakening until Freya had suggested that providing her with Trial of Radiance now, would likely lead to her too awakening as an Irregular.
Ori had questioned the logic of the assumption at first, but after reviewing the spell, he realised there was no real reason why, after technically completing her trial by assisting him in the dismantling of the demon gate, Trial of Radiance’s effects couldn’t apply.
Whether she should become one of his bonded warlocks, however, was another question.
Pushing aside such thoughts, Ori focused on dismantling the former Gateway as his attention turned towards his date with Tess.
Ori watched from the side as Tess spoke with the survivors, many of whom had been taken captive from settlements across the lower half of the southern continent. For most, the trauma of displacement, abuse, and lost loved ones would only ease with time. Still, with injuries healed, the land cleansed of everything but memory, and the ring he had used to store the bodies from the pit, one of seven he had planned to sell on the black market on Caoimhe’s advice, now donated to the villagers, Ori believed their fates were back in their own hands.
“What did they say about the light spell?” Ori asked as a jubilant Tess strode back towards him. “You said not to take it down?”
“I think they want to try rebuilding here,” Tess said as she joined him. “Your spell is doing a lot to heal the land and the people.”
Ori nodded, then smirked. “Looking forward to our date?”
“Yes.” Tess matched his smirk. “I don’t think I’ve looked forward to anything more in my life. But Ori, aren’t you worried about going back to Thorncross? Won’t you be recognised?”
Ori scratched at his scalp, weighing his options. With some of Caoimhe’s enchantments, he could camouflage himself well enough to pass for a different man.
“I’ll dress up. I’ll be fine.”
“Good.” Tess smiled. “Because I’ve already got something picked out to wear tonight.”
“Oh yeah?” Ori asked, his eyes drifting, unbidden, to her impossibly toned long legs.
Tess chuckled, catching the glance. “Yeah. Just a dress. But I think you’ll like it.”
“Can’t wait,” Ori said, as the stakes, as far as dress code went, rose once again. “I bet you’re looking forward to awakening.”
“Yes… of course. But more than that, I’m just happy.” Their hands met as they started towards Lucas, who had been called back for transport. “Happy to be with you. Happy to finally be starting my life, you know?”
“I’m probably looking forward to it just as much as you are.”
“I bet.” Tess gave him a small shove. “Now, shoo. I think you should speak to Ayame before we go. Find out what she wants. I can either get Lucas to drop her home, or…”
“Or?”
Tess shrugged. “She’s nice. There’s a little crazy under it, but the playful kind, I think.”
“Playful kind?” Ori repeated, bemused.
“Like… not deliberately malicious.” Tess’s eyes went thoughtful.
“Do you want her on your team?”
“Do you want her in your bed?” Tess countered. “I actually think she wants you for more than the just power you could offer. I think she wants us, really.”
“Why?”
Tess shrugged again. “She’s lonely, but I can only guess why. Anyway, go. Go do your thing and use those special charms of yours.” She pushed him away with a gentle shove, folding her arms as she giggled.
“Hey,” Ori said as he approached Ayame.
Ayame smiled, that same nervous energy still there, but laced with excitement and a giddiness that left her visibly buzzing. Ori gave a short laugh at the sight.
“Thanks for your help last night.”
“No, it’s fine. I mean, thank you. I’m just happy I got to be involved.”
“Well, we’ve finished up here, and we’re about to head back home,” Ori said.
“Oh.” Her nervous smile faltered.
“Yeah, and I was wondering what your plans are?” Ori said.
“Well, yes, I’m free. No plans at all, really.” She hesitated, fingers fidgeting. “I was kind of hoping… Tess has been really nice, and you told me about that group you’re forming, your delving team? And now that I can awaken, I was wondering if I’d be… suitable for consideration?”
Ori smiled. “Yeah. You would.”
“Good.” Ayame let out a breath. “Thank you. I mean, I, Satō Ayame, formally request to join your team, and all it entails.”
“All it entails?” Ori asked, a suggestive smirk creeping across his lips.
“Yes.” She lifted her chin. A small smile broke through her nerves. “If you could see yourself being with someone like me.”
“I could.” Ori watched her. “Could you see yourself being with someone like me? Someone with other lovers?”
“Yes,” she said, surprising him with her decisiveness. “I could. Especially if they’re all as nice as Tess, Freya, and Rue.”
Ori chuckled. “Alright. We’ll talk more about it later. For now, do you want to come back to Strafhollow with us, or should I take you to Morforth?”
“With you, please. It would be awkward going back after packing my things and leaving a goodbye note.” She pressed her index fingers together, embarrassed.
“Alright, then,” Ori said, before guiding Ayame onto Lucas’s back, this time with Tess as pilot. He had previously decided on Lucus to do two trips to cover the relatively short distance between the Stablemere and Strafhollow.
As the noonday light cast a white band across the horizon, Ori watched Tess and Ayame depart on Lucas’s powerful wings. He remained seated in the grass with Ruenne’del in his lap, her back and wings against his chest, his arms wrapped around her middle.
Through the bond, she seemed at peace, her desires sated and quiet. A world away from the near-manic levels of expectation, suspense, and ecstasy she had carried the night before. Where death or defeat would have been failure for him, or for almost anyone else, Ruenne’del cared less for outcomes than for the uncertainty, and the way events unravelled.
Through him, through actions and consequences that were a mystery even to her divination, the previous night had been a feast: anticipation, adrenaline-fed uncertainty, then momentous outcomes even she could not foresee. It left her full of what she had been craving for most of her life. The gateway had been her gift to him, but the act of him unwrapping it had likely been the thrill of a lifetime for her.
Ori kissed the back of her neck. She noticed, smirked, and twisted towards him, then shifted fully to return his attention. Her kiss was deep and hungry, almost as if she was breathing him in. Ori matched her, hands roaming over her woollen jumper, the fabric a frustrating barrier to the closeness he wanted.
Their foreheads met. They lingered there for a long, wind-swept moment, the silence broken only by the rustle of grass and the distant sounds of villagers rebuilding their lives.
“Thank you,” Ori said at last, sending as much gratitude through the bond as he could for the events of the last few days.
“Mmm,” Ruenne’del replied in either acceptance or appreciation, rubbing her nose against his. Her soft weight settled into him, rocking slowly against his groin as a more insistent mutual need rose through the bond.
“In the woods,” Ori said, half statement, half question, knowing they had time before Lucas returned.
Ruenne’del nodded without words, cheeks flushed. She slid off his lap and then smoothed her skirt. A moment later, they were hurrying into the trees hand in hand, heedless of the knowing looks the villagers cast after them.
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