Oh, ho! “Forgive my impertinence, but you speak like one familiar with Humans, Your Majesty.”

I noted the Crystal Moon Owl had soundlessly withdrawn, and it was just me and this gargantuan Owl, who was studying me very curiously, indeed.

“Long, long ago, I was contracted to a Human of great wisdom and power. Her aid granted me the strength to become what I am today, but that has been many thousands of your years ago. Given your short lifespans, she may not even be remembered, and she was both envied and feared during her life.”

“If it has been thousands of years, she may well be forgotten,” I admitted. “Do you remember her name?”

“She was called Ohomisk among Humans, and was revered and feared for her bonds with the Owls. Some of her descendants still call on us, but they are few and far between, especially since the other Humans came from overseas and killed many of them.”

Owl Woman?, I thought to myself.

“For her sake, I am willing to entertain the belief that the misty fire you bring may well be something special and useful to the Emperors. What, exactly, makes you think so?” he asked me directly, clearly not completely convinced.

“Your Majesty, it is mostly the nature of the planar rupture and the Taint upon the Night Hunter that the Owls and Golden Hart killed. It has all the hallmarks of a Lower Plane Bleeding into another Plane, and such energies are the truest fuel for vivic flame, like fire feasts best on dry flakes of wood and leaves, and can spread madly and consume everything in the way if it gets them.

“The nature of Taint is to try and convert the energy of another Realm into itself. Vivus is a form of Taint from our side of the equation, eating their energy and making it into the energy of THIS Realm.” I tapped the smooth bark beneath me, the branch wide enough to fit a mansion on it. “Thus, instead of Corrupting things of this Realm, it becomes fuel aiding the growth of it!

“The expansion of the intruding Realm will stop and slowly be reversed if enough vivus can saturate the area.” I made up a helpful Holo displaying circles of corruption around an intruding hole or Gate, and how the expansion was slowly gobbled up as the vivus pressed it from all sides. “Eventually it gets to the point where the intruding world has coughed up so much energy that it can’t sustain itself staying open, and the Breach between Worlds closes. Trying to keep it open just feeds the effect further and further... there is no way for the intruding World to win, as it is literally giving the target World more strength the longer it stays open.”

King Cloud Moon looked very interested at that. “But you are not certain of this.”

I could only nod. “That is correct. I won’t know until I see the intruding creatures and the region of Planar instability. It will be quick and easy to test at that point, if for no other reason than any vivus will burn more strongly in areas with more fuel.

“There is also one more important reason.”

He tilted his massive head to one side. “What reason?” he asked directly, not about to play word games.

“Do you have any experience with the creatures coming from the Breach?” I asked him carefully.

“Only those Tainted who have come to this territory. They are killed and Fire is used to burn them away to ash...”

“You’ve heard stories, however, Your Majesty?” I asked directly.

“I have...”

“Would I be amiss in describing them as spirits of the dead, returned to walk the world of the living once more, be they mortals or Beasts?” I flipped up Holos of various forms of undead, and the creatures that were often associated with them, and he studied them with interest.

“The Dark World and its Lords are mighty and powerful, and have drawn many to their side with their powers over death and darkness, even if it means betraying the Lord of All Beasts.” He said the name with great reverence. “This is true even in the Mortal World, and it is true that some of the servants of the Dark World sent forth here seem to be the souls of dead mortals, as well as many Corrupted Beasts who now live in the Dark Realm.”

“Then without vivus, you may be in an unwinnable situation,” I informed him directly. “Creatures of the dead do not always die when you destroy their bodies. Their spirits escape, go forth to create a new body, and come back to gain vengeance upon their killers, or those like them.”

He watched closely as I made a Holo showing a scythe-bearing skeletal zombie thing entering combat with a golden Lion, getting mauled to pieces and burning away, only for its spirit to go into the ground, return through the Breach to the other side, rise again in the Dark Realm, and make its way back through the Breach to fight again, seeking out other great Lions to vent its rage on.

“You may not be fighting the armies of the intruding world, but the same army over and over and over again,” I said softly. “Which means, without a way to stop those creatures from returning, you are destined to lose the fight. Their army is only getting better at fighting Beasts at all levels, and your side is simply dying and being Corrupted.”

His feathers and wings actually ruffled audibly, and the wind and cold in the chamber swirled with both anger and dread. This was obviously not an opponent he wanted to take on.

“I will do my duty and take you to the Flowing Silver Emperor, who rules this territory.”

“If it is not an imposition, Your Majesty, I would like to first fight some of the beings who have come up out of the Dark Realm at the fringes of the area in question. The information might be valuable in how we should proceed.”

He tilted his head at me curiously. “Very well. As long as we do not proceed deeper into the depths of the territory, that should not be an issue.”

And so the course for my next step was set.

======

King Cloud Moon issued some orders about for his people, nothing very radical, as the whole process was basically self-governing on instinct and power, and any conflicts between races could wait until he returned. If someone decided to make a challenge while he was going away to meet Flowing Silver Emperor, the retaliation that might come from not giving the Emperor face was enough to stop most kinds of nonsense, and the Beasts didn’t much use things like subterfuge and espionage, those being Human innovations that were beneath them.

Then there was only to climb aboard, be completely buried in silky white feathers thrumming with far too much power to the touch, and barely needing to hold on as he spread his wings out and took flight.

I couldn’t even tell he was flying, it was more like drifting, the air held in the grip of his will with absolute surety and skill. I wouldn’t have known how fast he was moving if my Detect Location wasn’t recording my position and how fast we were moving... a leisurely 450 mph or so, I calculated.

Yeah, pretty terrifying, much more dangerous than the dragons and stuff from Terra-Luna. This place was crazy broken if Humans had to fight these things. How did they even manage to survive and build a civilization?

Whatever, my job was to get my rep counts in and familiarize myself somewhat with the Mana here and how it wanted to be shaped.

---

“You do not use magic like most Humans.”

Cloud Moon’s voice reverberated all around me. He was naturally sensitive to what I was doing, even if all I was doing was sending flights of Shards out for rep counts to reduce the cost of the Metas I needed down to nil.

I would need to get to Three in something to do the job for my +II’s. I had a lot of Metas to regain, and now I could get through the rep counts faster than I could regain them.

A good problem to have, I suppose!

“I suppose that is true, Elder. Or, it might be more accurate to say that I don’t know how to use the magic like other people do. The ambient Mana is very powerful and doesn’t lend itself well to more subtle uses. It’s like trying to wave a single feather and the entire wing beats, or something.”

“The beginning skill of the Void Magic is the ability to move objects from point to point in space,” he pointed out. “Compressing the Void into a flight of missiles is... somewhat more advanced than a Novice Mage is supposed to be able to perform...”

“Doubtless. But you will notice that my use of Force Magic is several Classes softer than your own magic, even when binding other energies about them. I imagine others using the magic the way I am can achieve far more spectacular effects.”

“Are you unable to move from place to place?” he asked, definitely curious now.

“Potentially. I haven’t figured out the method to do so.” I didn’t know what these Stars of mine could do, except interact with my Matrix and be carried along.

“Test your Will,” he murmured, and a crushing spiritual pressure immediately descended upon me.

I promptly discarded all other distractions and Focused. Everything fell away as I formed a blade and point of my Will, raising it against this formless blunt pressure crushing down on me, sloughing it off to the sides and away as I sliced into it and diverted it under the pressure of its own making, turning the pressure against itself and allowing me to persist as it came down at me.

It was incredible and all-dominating. I knew I could be crushed in an instant if the King Owl decided to do so, but that was not a surprise to me at all. He was at least a 20-HD creature, fully able to kick Rocs around before considering any magic, which was the important thing. Aelryinth would probably have been able to withstand the blunt force of his Will, but I was just a tiny sliver of a soul, building myself back up.

That said, Concentration and focus was still our thing. The weight could come down and crush me, but it could not make me bend until that moment came, only compress me down, down, down as it pressed down on mind, body, and soul...

The pressure vanished as easily and rapidly as it had come down. I gasped for breath for a full minute, forcing my lungs to inhale in defiance of what had been at least ten gravities of physical pressure. Like a cold river, my blood had continued to circulate as my heart burned with defiance, keeping me from physically blacking out under the assault.

“Your Will is strong for your age. Humans have always been better at things of the mind and soul than pure power...” Cloud Moon said knowingly. “You have more than enough Will to do such a simple thing. Can you not connect your Stars for some reason?”

A little bell went off in my mind, and all my Stars seemed to sit up straighter. Connecting the Stars did things? “In what pattern, Elder? There are like five thousand different configurations I could use just for the connections, and that is ignoring three-dimensional positioning, and in which order the connections should be made.”

His head turned ever-so-slightly. “I... do not know?” he admitted. “Human Magic is very different from that of other species.”

“Yeah, we’re a bunch of creative idiot Monkeys, that’s us,” I agreed with a sigh, which earned a hoot of amusement from him. The number of Star combos was 7!, linking them in potentially 5040 different combinations. Then multiply by 6! for the possible orders in which they were linked, so x720 more possible variants, and that was all ignoring if there was any three-dimensional positioning involved, which would make them proper Runecraft.

Ugh. That would be a LOT of time wasted on experimenting...