Skyvenom: Chapters 22-23

Here are your chapters for this week.

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Chapter 22

Now that they finally had a multi-lateral agreement to negotiate in Accilonia, the sword hanging over Theo's head should have pulled back, but he couldn't relax. Vistgil hadn't shown up to annihilate everyone, so it wasn't a worst case scenario. But the threats he faced now were more insidious.

Since the interrupted battle, Nourise had barely spoken to any of them, instead engaging in her own preparations. The unspoken assumption was that going to Accilonia was an opportunity for her, both her own soulcrafting and her court's reputation, so Theo and his allies had plummeted on her priority list. If only the timing had been better and they'd finished their missions to earn her loyalty first.

Then again, could they really have earned any loyalty that would stand up to all these pressures? Nourise had been polite, but that meant nothing. It was entirely possible that if circumstances changed she would withdraw her support from the convocation, which meant they'd have no choice but to flee. The Deuxans of Ostic seemed relaxed and friendly, but he'd bet that they'd be just as relaxed putting a dagger into his back.

So far the new potential profits seemed to lean in their favor... he just had no guarantee that would remain constant, and no confidence Nourise wouldn't betray them if profitable.

The fact that everything else was so tense just made it feel perverse that he was having so much fun soulcrafting. Even though Theo couldn't keep the political balance out of his mind, it just slipped through while he dug with a smile on his face. He always enjoyed soulcrafting, but it hadn't felt so free and open-ended in years. Maybe ever since his return.

Currently he was using a spirit shovel to dig his way underneath his soulhome. After he'd broken open the basement on a fundamental level, the dirt had gone back to normal - in fact, it was easier than any shoveling he'd ever done in the real world, because everything in his soul cooperated. There was still an expenditure of focus and willpower, so he couldn't finish the basement immediately, but he could see the progress with every hour of soulcrafting.

How long would it take him to finish digging out a new room? He wasn't sure, which was almost exciting. In the two weeks since the announcement, he had only completed the western chamber, but there had been digging from the sides and lessons learned, so he estimated he could finish one per week in the future.

Purchasing the shovel had sped things up and he barely even noticed the price - they still had more than eight thousand of the Silver Crowns they'd won previously. Those would disappear much faster if they started buying sublime materials, but he wasn't planning to do much of that.

Though, for the first time, he actually could. Opening up all this space meant that he actually had new open rooms that weren't already committed to his blueprint. It felt decadent compared to his careful planning, and especially compared to his highly restricted plan for his second cube of chambers. Of course, he'd need to develop a high quality plan for his basement eventually, but for now he soulcrafted freely and joyously.

In the short term, he wanted to increase his defenses even further. With so many Strongholds taking action, there was always the chance that one of them would try to ambush him, and he wanted every possible defense to make sure that wouldn't work. Winning such a fight would still be difficult, but given the terms of the convocation, surviving long enough might be victory.

Eventually, however, Theo had exhausted his capacity to dig and had no choice but to leave his soulhome. He returned to their physical chambers and dimly remembered that Fiyu and Nauda had left to go confirm things in Anguedan. Since Krikree was busy scouting, that left him mostly to himself.

Theo glanced around the room and saw that another antidote pill had been delivered, so he found some water and swallowed it. After talking to the poison specialist - who was named Clovikan - Theo had settled on a plan of neutralizing the poison's negative symptoms but taking no other action. The pills he was taking should completely eliminate the pain and disruption to cantae, which was enough for now. Dealing with the poison in the clouds of his soulhome was a higher tier problem he'd have to worry about later.

It was hard to get too worried about that, though, when he had so much work to do on his basement. Yes, a Stronghold ascension would help, but that would just open up the next stage of his plan. The basement was nothing but possibilities.

"What has you so happy?" Senka asked as she floated into the room. She rubbed one eye as if she'd just woken up.

"Just engaged with the basement soulcrafting," Theo said. "When I died before, I'd hit Stronghold but only just heard about basements. This is the first time I'm unquestionably superior to my past soulhome."

"Oh, I think you were superior the moment you stopped following Vistgil's blueprints and made something for yourself." Senka looked at him for several blinks, then her sleepy expression twisted into a smirk. "You can try to sound calm and composed all you want, but I can tell you're just salivating to get back to your work."

"Can you blame me? The only reason I'm not going in back now is because I tired myself out and I don't want to break through any of my basement walls. Or should I clear out everything and then build new walls from sublime stone?"

"You want to build your own barriers. It isn't nearly as fast as the open air, but your cantae will leak out into the soil. Good for your foundation, maybe, but inefficient."

Theo dropped onto the couch and gestured for Senka to join him. "I'm trying to decide if I stick to the foundation stones of my main soulhome or dig out further. There doesn't seem to be much stopping me until I get closer to my shielding wall."

"If you want to maximize space, you could go to your shielding wall," Senka said as she drifted down onto the far arm of the couch, "but that isn't usually recommended in case you need soil or deep roots later. Besides, the entire rest of your blueprint is so regimented, why break your pattern now?"

"You're probably right. It's just fun to feel like I could take this in any direction. Usually I'm following my blueprint, and figuring out my Authority tier was a constant struggle against the constraints."

"Bah, you know you love it."

Theo grinned and didn't deny anything. "Is there a conventional use for basements? I'll need to start refining it eventually."

"Technically once you've dug out and surrounded some chambers below-ground, you can use them for anything you want. However... there's a slight difference to the underground chambers." Senka settled back, her eyes trailing over the ceiling as if searching for something. "Your other chambers are like a projection of your soul, and they're obviously part of you, but the chambers in your foundation are tied to you in a deeper way."

"Suggesting they could be especially good for certain uses? Would it make sense to put a Corporeal Floor in your basement?"

"That would certainly be extremely strongly unified with your body and soul, but that's usually considered a drastic measure. Technically, there's nothing stopping you from building anything at all in your basement, but you want to optimize for its unique properties."

"You've been pretty cagey about those."

"Because I'm struggling to remember all the details." Senka rubbed her eyes roughly before continuing. "One of the most common is to enhance sublime materials. You've run into problems finding strong enough materials now that you're an Authority, right? Of course you have. Well, you can do all kinds of refining, growing, or improving in your soulhome. The basement tends to be a good place for that and it lets you use the main floors for combat."

"Hmm, is that similar to the way Nauda is growing sublime food out of her soulhome?" Theo hadn't been too involved with that, but he'd provided suggestions and accepted the food she offered. It was definitely an improvement to the Deuxan part of his Nine Worlds Feast despite all the meals he'd been given in Greater Ostic.

"She's using the same principle, sure. There are lots of methods of working sublime materials, starting from the very first tier, they're just increasingly important as you ascend."

"As soulcrafting takes more and more time, seems like there'd be incentive to make others do that work for you. In your era, did you have lots of soulcrafters working to make bricks or other materials for the strongest?"

"A few tried it, but the drawbacks are pretty large." Senka shook her head. "Use too much material from others and your soulhome won't really be yours anymore. Worse than that, if someone hates you, they could hide tiny fractures or impurities to try to sabotage you. No, it's usually best to limit outsiders to a few items, like the Noveni artisans. To really advance via co-soulcrafting, you need people you can trust."

Theo sat forward as he put together several things Senka had said in the past. "Was that what you meant about our group being able to support one another later on?"

"Exactly. Nauda will be able to grow and saturate sublime plants better than the two of you, but you'll have your specialties too. I hate to admit it, but you need teamwork to keep ascending, at least if you want to do it without spending decades making everything yourself."

"Yeah, I can understand that. Complex to get into the details, but the principle is simple." Theo was inspired to get back to work and started to enter his soulhome before he stopped. "So when are you going to stop lazing around and help?"

Senka's eyes widened for a second, then narrowed. "What, you want me to vomit up a bunch of blook for you?"

"No, I mean once we get your weird compressed soulhome fixed, will you be able to produce something for us?"

"Not soon." Senka turned away, but he thought he saw her smile. "None of you are ready for the kinds of sublime materials I could create."

She wouldn't want to say more than that, so Theo returned to his soulcrafting. Now that she had explained more of the potential, he definitely had a new way to frame his work.

As he got back to digging, he imagined his future workshop around him. Except that just using the entire basement on a workshop would be inefficient, as far as he was concerned. Could he create chambers that were both enhancement chambers as well as material-creation workshops? Usually spirit tools didn't give off any cantae on their own, but the tables and other materials could be built from strong sublime materials.

Of course, all of that was a dream for now. Theo dug until he couldn't anymore, then went back up to get construction materials. He didn't need to finalize the walls now, just stop the cantae leakage. It only took about an hour to carve large tiles out of his usual sublime stone, which he used to line the walls of his first finished chamber. Then he could put up a plinth and some sublime materials whenever he wanted another strengthening chamber.

Even as he worked on that idea, he realized that he was still thinking too small. He couldn't fully integrate his basement with his first floor, since that would interfere with the spherical flow, but he could have cantae from the basement flow upward to reinforce it. And if he did that, he needed to come up with a whole new set of synergies that he'd never imagined.

Theo walked back up to his front floor and passed through it, which was almost like wandering through his past. It felt like so long ago that he'd gathered these materials, but many had actually been in Deuxan. Back then he'd just struggled to find the only sublime materials he could to represent concepts like gravity. Now that he'd soulcrafted so far, each additional material became more difficult.

But that didn't mean it was impossible to keep synergizing, even given limited materials. Theo examined his torsion bolt chamber and realized that might be his best option. Ostic was filled with wind-related materials and he was sure that he'd seen some that involved wind twisting around itself. One of those could increase his speed while adding just a little more bite to his torsion bolts.

To do that, he'd have to keep digging, because he'd started on the wrong side of his soulhome. Theo grabbed his shovel and threw himself back into the work.

Eventually they'd need to leave Greater Ostic and journey to Accilonia Court, where he would have to deal with much larger problems, from Brigana's family to the convocation of souls to potentially Vistgil. But until then, he would... oh, wait, what if he used the entrance tunnels as exits similar to windows? Perhaps if he built cellar doors...

Chapter 23

After so long in the city of Central Ostic, Anguedan seemed almost quaint. Nauda remained on alert throughout their visit, just in case other vendettas lingered, but all evidence pointed to a sleepy frontier town. Now she understood why their court wasn't considered important, though in their place she would have leaned into the Tatian gate to try to gain an edge. Deuxans seemed to stick to themselves, from what she'd seen so far.

Still, it wasn't going to be a long visit. They only needed to stop back to talk to Janne and Nanjuma, just to make sure that no one had tried to attack. Fortunately, it seemed like everyone had ignored Anguedan in favor of the Strongholds involved.

"I'm sorry again that Nanjuma couldn't greet you," Bimanu said. "He would have wanted to, but he's still journeying to the south."

"Have you heard from him?" Nauda asked. "Or are you just assuming?"

"No, he returned once to exchange materials and make sure nothing had collapsed. It seems there's a Deuxan court down there, though not an important one, that might be persuaded. In any case, you can count on me to keep contact with the Landguard. Technically I shouldn't be spending so much time here, but we owe you."

"We're grateful that you're making it right." Nauda smiled and clasped the Landguard's arm. "With any luck, we'll deal with our own problems and this will never trouble Tatian again."

"I hope so, but all I can do is play guard and leave the rest to you."

They squeezed forearms one last time before parting ways. Nauda glanced south once, wishing that she could have met Nanjuma instead, but she couldn't afford to spend more time here. They had barely gotten an Authority with a weirkey to take them back, much less off to unknown courts. At least now that the business was done, she could meet Fiyu again.

That was relatively easy: she only needed to search Anguedan for Authority-tier cantae. Fiyu's was hidden behind her improved shielding wall, of course, but Janne followed no such niceties. The two of them weren't far away, meeting in one of the town squares. Nauda walked toward it, wondering if that was the same fountain they had visited years ago... no, she didn't think so, just a similar one.

"-still very grateful for your help," Fiyu was saying. "We would likely not have been able to establish ourselves here without your assistance."

"I wish I could have done more," Janne said. "But you're clearly involved in something heavy."

"Will you return to Norro Yorthin?"

"How likely are you to call me again?"

They had discussed this question and their strategy before, so Fiyu answered immediately. "It seems that the convocation will only consider Strongholds from this point on, so so you should not stay for our sake."

"I might stay a while for mine." Janne looked out over the houses with an unfocused gaze. "I'm on the trail of potentially useful sublime materials. But if you don't have cause to come back here soon... I'll see you back in Norro Yorthin." She turned and inclined her head at Nauda, but didn't come closer to speak. Nauda realized that Janne was wearing a Deuxan cloak over her other layers, and those silver shoes were likely local as well.

Once the Blacksilver Authority was gone, Fiyu turned back to her with a smile. "Are you ready to go, Nauda?"

"I think we've done everything we can here. Back to Ostic?"

"Yes, once we can find our escort. How will you spend your last week?"

"Finishing up those bridges and putting as much time into my next floor as possible."

"What do you think Theo will be doing?" Fiyu immediately smiled mischievously. "That was a joke. Clearly he will be working on his basement."

"No question of that." Nauda took Fiyu's hand and walked her down the street. "Come on, let's make sure he doesn't pull ahead."

~ ~ ~

Because they traveled to Accilonia by weirkey, there was no time to approach the city and come to grips with it. One moment Nauda floated with the rest, for a timeless blip she twisted between worlds, and then suddenly she was in the sky over one of the largest cities she had ever seen.

For the first time since entering Deuxan, she saw a city that rivaled Norro Yorthin. Except where the Fithan city was bound within vast walls, thus dense and multi-leveled, the city of Accilonia sprawled over numerous hills. In places she saw an entire hill dominated by a single complex, no doubt controlled by a specific family. Elsewhere she saw elegant silver bridges spanning the distance between other hills, so large that there were shops built atop them.

When she turned around, she saw that the hills increased in size until the largest was a small mountain. The rocks themselves seemed to be formed of pure silver, except that it let off a glow that reminded her of the moon. Instead of shining metal, the walls on the mountain were made of dark stone, which became otherworldly in the glow from all around it.

She had no more time to admire the city because Nourise was heading directly toward the top, where a vast palace squatted over the top of the mountain. It was also formed of dark stone except for pieces of metal that outlined all of the doorways and arches, which were so pale they were almost white. There was no question that was the seat of Accilonia, the highest court on the continent.

Not the highest court involved with their war, though, if Theo was right about the Demon and Mercury Courts. Nauda swallowed and hastened to fly in formation.

Their group landed gracefully on one of many balconies around the sides of the central palace, which were no doubt designed for that very purpose. Servants assured them that they would be given full hospitality, but also seemed eager to rush them inward - Nauda heard whispers that the others had already arrived and Nourise muttered something about Sartozi, but it was too late to argue.

As they walked inward, Nauda found herself impressed. Less because of the shimmering halls, which were a grander version of what she'd seen elsewhere on Deuxan, and more because of the architecture. Everything was over-sized and the gates grew subtly larger, giving the guest a sense of shrinking insignificance.

Through the largest door they entered a chamber of shocking size. The central floor was a circle of reflective marble with a wall around it so high she felt like she stood at the bottom of a well. Silver and gold thrones sat all around the top as if in judgment.

Their occupants were mostly the Strongholds who would decide their fate, but Nauda was more intrigued by the details. The metal of the thrones didn't seem related to rank, instead matching the leader who sat on them. Not all were Strongholds, either, yet the arrangement suggested they were all equals. Well, not the enormous empty throne opposite the entrance walkway: that could only be the seat of the Dominion who ruled over Accilonia.

All of it was designed to intimidate, and she had to admit it was working. Nauda squared her shoulders and resolved not to flinch, no matter what happened.

~ ~ ~

As the leaders and Strongholds introduced themselves, one after another, Fiyu struggled to keep up with the names of all the people and places. It shouldn't be allowed, for so many people to arrive all at once.

To soothe herself, she instead focused on the elaborate patterns of the thrones curved around the central floor. They were surprisingly multi-layered - most of the filigree she had seen on Deuxan was only a single surface layer, but each throne had been fashioned from layer upon layer of metal. She didn't think the interior patterns were entirely intentional, certainly not planned for Ichili senses, but they were pleasant in the manner of a natural formation.

Much less pleasant was what Fiyu sensed as her senses pushed further. There were dense anti-weirkey structures placed all over the city, most of them preventing new arrivals from appearing directly in the middle. An ominous number of them, especially here in the grand court chamber, would prevent anyone from using a weirkey to depart.

For that matter, the material itself was unusually dense, both physically and with cantae. Everything seemed to be made of second stage materials, meaning that they would stand up to far more punishment. Even Dominions, who could obliterate lesser cities, would need to exert themselves to break through such powerful fortifications.

If the grand doors behind them were closed and locked, how long would it take Fiyu to cut through them? She didn't think her cantae blade could be stopped entirely, not now that she had Authority-tier cantae, but it would take an unacceptably long amount of time for a retreat.

Did this council expect an actual battle to take place here? Or was this a sign of something even worse?

Not that any of the constructions would matter, since the Strongholds seated around the room were by far the largest threat. With so many, no strategy she attempted would be effective: even if she used her stealth, they could easily flood the room with attacks, almost certainly for longer than she could go incorporeal.

Fiyu resolved not to show any weakness. She had defended her companions through dark realms, so now she would have to trust them to shield her through realms of politics.

~ ~ ~

Theo hadn't been entirely sure what to expect from Accilonia Court. He was that fairly confident that back when he had been with Brigana it had been discussed, but that had been over a century ago and his younger self hadn't been paying enough attention. At the time, the leaders had made him feel like the center of the world, which was laughable now that he had a broader understanding of Deuxan.

Along the way he had received additional information from Nourise, who seemed to be on their side at least to this point. Apparently they were to say absolutely nothing about the Teraeves family, which was taboo at normal times and utterly anathema now that the Demon Court was involved. Despite all their posturing, the Accilonia court was actually nervous.

That was one thing that exactly matched his expectations: grand throne room, all metals, designed to intimidate. Very Deuxan. He was just impressed they didn't go with silver everything.

He was much more interested in all of the Strongholds who had come to participate. As he understood it, most were only observers, not participants in the convocation of souls. But depending on how he presented his arguments, some of them could well join, if they thought it was in their best interest. The balance of power could tilt wildly, and if it tilted far enough, Nourise suggested that it wasn't impossible that the court would immediately execute the failing party.

The way she said it, he suspected that she would forsake them if the balance turned far enough against them. It wouldn't even be betrayal, simple self-interest. That just meant he absolutely needed to play the game.

Nourise herself wasn't standing with them, of course, instead taking her throne to represent Greater Ostic. Sartozi was also seated, not in a position that particularly suggested he opposed her, so Theo would have to draw the battle lines himself. More notable was the fact that he saw no one from the Demon Court, or anyone who looked obviously foreign who might represent the Mercury Court.

And yet there were two others in the audience: an Arbaian wearing gold plate and a Slescan queen who stood out in her purple robes. The Slescan was a full Stronghold and sat in a throne carved like the other Accilonian thrones, wearing a silver crown as if she was local. The Arbaian was only an Authority, but sat on the lone stone seat in the council, as if Arbaians had a vote here.

He'd suspected that Accilonia must have gates, but hadn't been given information about this. Had his allies assumed that he already knew, or intentionally deprived him of key intelligence? There was no time to second guess now, because the old man floated from an opening in the ceiling and descended to the silver throne just beneath the largest one.

"For our outsiders, I am Tabrien, currently aima Accilonia in lieu of our beloved Dominion." The old man swept his gaze over the assembled group and gave them all a very narrow smile. "I'm pleased to see so many in attendance, because this little rural squabble has become unnecessarily large. We will begin with statements from the parties involved."

Theo opened his mouth to say what he'd prepared, but at that moment the doors behind him creaked open. Esaire strode through them, and for the first time since the initial conflict, Amaeli walked with him. Their faces left no indication of what they were thinking or how much of this had been planned.

"Esaire ai Armeau, welcome." Tabrien gestured carelessly to the group below. "You should go first."