Amdirlain’s PoV - Material Plane - Qil Tris - Year 4370 (Local calendar)
With the ignition of her aura, seven looming figures in the tunnel shifted and moved. Analysis protested with static, but Amdirlain grabbed the details of the closest of the void spawns. As she pushed Ki and Primordial Mana into it, Ki State’s armouring rose to cover her suddenly furless flesh. The glowing gaze of her Anar form reflected in the mist.
[Species: Loathsome Void Spawn
Primordial Tier: 2
Health: 1,423,898
Melee Attack Power: 8,923]
The closest trio fired cables towards her. Lifting a blade to slide aside the first, a note empowered within the motion pushed through the churning aura around her. A thin wisp of her aura lashed across the Eldritch’s twisting form. The incoming attacks drove through three metres of aura in a blink and, though the tentacles charred, they didn’t incinerate. A shower of Eldritch bolts clawed at her aura and, as they continued to rain down, Amdirlain teleported forward.
The flames stuttered into existence around the pair at the group’s rear, but the Eldritch didn’t flinch away. Her reappearance had barbed spikes and dozens of claws seeking to rend her constantly moving form.
Amdirlain’s movements and sudden position shifts avoided scores of attacks, and her aura and Ki State deflected more. Amid the fighting, blood ran from a growing collection of minor wounds, but others that would have struck true, Amdirlain assaulted directly—the ash of severed limbs stirred within the entities’ mist. Leaving a pair of flasks at one’s base, Amdirlain teleported further along the tunnel. Its crushing weight raced forward, and an explosion of Yang flames lit up the tunnel.
The flames ripped into the group’s centre, illuminating the figures too well. The sight of their flesh rippling into and out of existence added to the mental pressure from Resonance. Spinning towards her, their strange undulating forms created loathsome silhouettes in the backdrop of the flames. They charged her position, and their tentacles whipped forward only to turn into solid blades, or maws slavering for flesh.
More void spawns drifted towards her from surrounding tunnels, beckoned by the flame’s energy.
Yang is life energy; it hurts them yet tempts them as moths to a flame.
Amdirlain reformed into a spiked sea anemone beneath their attacks. Her blades, held in tentacles, rent flesh in a pair of strikes before she left elixirs behind and shifted position again. More flames erupted, and the approaching void spawns quickened their pace. Clear of the attacks and searing Yang flames, a constellation of seven pinpoints of white flame leapt from her hand, and Amdirlain ran.
The flames burnt their way into one of her foes, staggering it. Its momentum was slow, but still, it carried on. Then flames erupted from the wound and its shifting orifices as a section of the thing exploded. Even as fire cooked deeper into their charred flesh, body parts and fire showered across its allies. Badly wounded, the thing still unrelentingly pressed forward, but the Primordial flame left an ash-covered wound that didn’t seal.
Amdirlain took the first route away from the oppressive silence in the main chamber. Catapulting another Yang elixir at the group behind her, its explosions ate into flesh, and the nearby void spawns approach turned into a sprint. Ki Movement boosted her speed further to keep ahead of them. As she raced through the mist-filled passages, Amdirlain tossed minor spells with Yang Mana to bait them into following.
A pack of void spawn larvae raced towards the approaching corner, and Amdirlain tested the Phoenix’s Rapture ability to hold form. As her body compressed, Ki Flight held her falcon form aloft, its lesser speed causing her to linger over the pack beneath. They had enough time to swing their tentacles before bursting into ashes, and their momentum carried them forward to spread along the passage.
Rather than use more of the elixirs immediately, Amdirlain cast a Flame Armour around herself using Yang Mana. The Spell’s strength drew attention from further afield, and Amdirlain resumed her Anar form. Racing towards a group of stronger void spawns, she slid around a corner and hooked the blades into an older entity. Bolts of purple Eldritch flame sank deep into her aura, and as more foes focused on her, Amdirlain’s flames stuttered. Appearing amidst the group, she jumped atop a lashing tentacle and tried to outrace its incineration.
Two themes exiting the main chamber’s smothering field confirmed the effigies weren’t the only things that had shifted into the tunnels. Teleport took Amdirlain to the next turn, and as the void spawns pursued, she used Analysis on the skinwalkers that had joined the chase.
[Name: Pa’rick, Manareins pride
Species: Eldritch Skinwalker
Primordial Tier: 2
Health: 476,298
Defence: 696
Magic: 3,914
Details: Pa’rick was a full-time arcane researcher working out of the Triumvirate Campus. He received an invitation to the cult from respected mentors. His focus on delving into mysteries pushed him through the ranks, and he gained a greater status and eventually progressed to the inner council.]
The second was the Skinwalker from the ruins; their magic rating had jumped.
[Name: Hal’tra, Whiteshield pride
Species: Eldritch Skinwalker
Primordial Tier: 2
Health: 874,124
Defence: 828
Magic: 4,997
Details: A member of a lesser branch of the Whiteshield pride, his ambition led him into the orbit of various professors seeking to master powers beyond the known arcane.
Hal’tra had a last moment of clarity before the summoned Skinwalker devoured him. Yet, he didn’t regret the path, only that he hadn’t grown strong enough to consume it instead.]
Its magic rating is now higher than Alyolhe’s. Best to not stand still.
Rounding another bend, Amdirlain heard the void spawns massing ahead of her. Dozens were coming into a large chamber through side tunnels and up a ramp from below. All drawn together by the roaring life energy around her. Charging through them, she teleported about—the stutter of flames turning the mass of foes into hideous shadows. The white Primordial fire changed the mists into opaque walls that obscured those furthest away. It was a small mercy as the twisting visages of those nearby had her mind struggling to translate flashes of their forms.
Shattered pots left puddles of acid chewing into barbequed flesh and lightning mists that illuminated distant corners. Her rapid position shifts among the horde didn’t prevent all injury, and flames would often enfold transforming limbs and provoke a strike. While blows lost momentum, chewed upon by the full breadth of her aura, it didn’t provide the same protection when the limb was already dangerously close.
The Eldritch’s whip-like limb would transform into dozens of thrusting blades, and with hundreds coming in from unexpected directions, attacks got through. She shifted between forms and snatched a blade into Inventory before it could plunge from an almost severed hand. The first few minutes had seen dozens of Eldritch fall, but her form was slick with blood. While most injuries sealed quickly, she continued to bleed from a few deeper wounds.
The weakest Skinwalker finally entering the chamber prompted her to change up her attacks. A Fire Storm Spell cooked the surrounding air, and Amdirlain teleported to a spot above its focal point to use its cover to snuff out her aura and armour. Teleport shifted her again, and Amdirlain brought Sarah’s boxy contraption to her shoulder, glad she’d idiot-proofed it so someone could only comfortably fire it one way.
Amdirlain fired not one canister but four at once. A pulse of isolated gravity pulled forward four tubes barely three centimetres long. The pressure overstressed pre-made fracture lines and the tubes turned into metal clouds. Their outer shell became shrapnel, still moving at subsonic speeds, and the flechette rounds within started to move erratically.
What the fuck did Sarah do?
Gravity Mana flared within the four compact masses, leaving the shell material behind. As thousands of needles jumped to Mach 6, multiple shock waves rolled through the tunnels. Primordial runes had barely ignited before the still bunched mass punched through the Skinwalker and at least seventeen void spawns before driving onward into the chamber’s far wall.
With its chest half obliterated, the Skinwalker started to turn, and Amdirlain lifted the device’s aiming reticle higher and fired again. As its head sprayed through the chamber, she stored the launcher and ignited her aura. The body staggered and straightened, only to catch the first and then the second cloud of Gravity-imbued metal. As it collapsed again, Amdirlain teleported forward to cleave it apart while her aura cremated its flesh. With the Spell’s flames raging, she teleported into another passage and started to gather more. As her wounds sealed, some of the badly burnt void spawns from the chamber gave chase.
Three hundred void spawns had perished before Amdirlain finally got into position to fire on the second Skinwalker. However, when she appeared behind it an armour of Eldritch flames ignited, and Amdirlain hastened away. Racing back through the tunnels towards the main chamber, she incinerated more void spawns and took every ramp she could find leading down.
Coming out into the main chamber, she found herself in a five-metre-tall gallery that afforded the mature void spawns plenty of clearance. In the central area, ramps spiralled between levels but the smaller, hound-sized void spawns ignored gravity to flit between them. The irregularly formed central shaft was at its widest point, thirty-three metres across.
Sprinting along the lip, Amdirlain glanced down and found three skinwalkers arrayed around a summoning circle that matched the one from beneath the lakeside retreat. They had their eyes closed, lips moved in an unsynchronised chant. However, the sound of their words got buried under the weight of the oppressive entity scarcely five metres from the circle’s outer edge.
With foes still chasing her, Amdirlain hadn’t received a combat summary since the fun began, but her stacked Mental Hardening still hadn’t progressed far enough. The glance she’d gotten of it had blood running from her nose and eyes, and Amdirlain made herself tumble further away. The formless being drank in all the meagre light and sound from around it while whispers tempted her to cast herself in and let oblivion claim her. Agony drove past Pain Eater and sucked at her Soul’s bindings. Her mind swam, and Amdirlain dragged herself further from the edge.
Does the insanity shield them?
As slithering sounds came from the last passage she’d exited, Amdirlain shakily teleported away. Stumbling to her feet, her blurred pace had turned into a drunken lurch, but Amdirlain kept moving, trying to buy more seconds of recovery. A fresh group of void spawns exited the silence and a still battered Amdirlain teleported higher in the tunnels. Sources of distortion pursued her, racing up the ramps and through the air of the main shaft. Plotting a path, she left delayed spells in her wake, and more baited Eldritch died.
Hundreds of eruptions of Primordial flames and elixirs catapulted into her pursers. More Eldritch crackled and burned while Amdirlain maneuvered about, seeking an opportunity. Whenever she deactivated her Phoenix’s Rapture, the whispers returned.
Unauthorized duplication: this narrative has been taken without consent. Report sightings.
The Skinwalker met her repeated attempts to gain a line-of-sight with defences snapping into place. An unnoticed pattern in her behaviour had it meeting her arrival with a Spell that clawed through her aura. Amdirlain teleported away, but the blast left her Ki State stinging from the close call. At the spots of steaming flesh on her arms, Amdirlain stopped to confirm nothing had seeded itself in her flesh. As it turned, seeking her, Amdirlain teleported again and killed off some wounded pursuers.
I need to get in a better position and have something it can’t shrug off with its magic rating against mine. Rock and hard place option? But I can’t trap every tunnel.
While she recovered from her close calls, Amdirlain culled more of the growing herd of void spawns, aware more entered the tunnels as time passed. Once she’d recovered from her close call, Amdirlain started to build a song, mimicking the flux of her twin shielding and flesh. Racing through corridors, she slipped between forms, dodging around tentacles and grasping claws. She burnt holes to join choice passages and continued to run.
As pursuit closed in, she teleported to let her flames stutter. Between one teleport and the next, she shut down her aura and spell and cloned them further away to lure them on the route she needed it to take. Teleport placed her behind it along the longest stretch of the corridors she''d created, and she unleashed a set of canisters. Ki Flight drifted her sideways, and with the aiming dot focused on its back, she rapidly triggered four more.
The distance allowed each canister’s flechette to bloom out further from its shell and, before the shockwave hit her, the first set had raced through the Eldritch. It fell and rolled, but a dome of Eldritch flame melted the following needles that pursued it. As it rode out more flechettes arriving, Amdirlain teleported into a passage she’d seen on the lowest level and kept her gaze at waist height. The corridor’s angle didn’t allow her to see the Delirium of Darkness on its platform, but it gave her line of sight on two of the summoners.
Even as Amdirlain pressed the runes to fire, another set of void spawns appeared in the circle. The closest summoner came apart when fragments bearing Primordial flames ripped through it, and a second and third set followed, blasting through him into the void spawns that now blocked the view. The theme of the strongest skinwalker raced for the central shaft, and Amdirlain shifted position. Leaping to choice spots its route should take it through, she set traps and moved on.
A length of stone ceiling wall collapsed when the Skinwalker entered a passage and quickly melted into Primordial essence under the impact of Amdirlain''s song. An Eldritch burst ripped the skinwalker free of the first trap, and charred, it ran on.
Rounding a corner triggered a linked song, and Amdirlain’s True Song blades catapulted through a dimensional opening, spinning as they burned. Staggered, it stumbled and, for a microsecond, a Gate flicked on, severing its legs at the ankles when it plunged partly through. With it slowed but recovering, Amdirlain cast again and rapidly dismissed the Spell; the Gate blinking out decapitated it. A flurry of gates followed, leaving it in wafer-thin pieces along the passage’s length. Not risking it might ooze together, Amdirlain raced forward, her aura flaring to life, leaving nothing but ash behind. Snatching up her blades, she moved on.
Teleport placed her back on the lowest level, and blasts of Primordial flame hurled the last two skinwalkers clear of the silence. As they skidded to a halt, cubes of True Song Crystal enfolded them. She lingered long enough to finish the outer seals before racing away to deal with the remaining Void Spawn. Empowering notes within her movements, she began turning wisps from her aura into directed gouts of Primordial flame.
It took hours of attrition by the time they were dead; she’d used up all the elixir pots and emptied Sarah’s launcher. With the tunnels cleared, she risked returning to the silence’s edge. Against the temptations that prickled along her skin, she pushed to complete the crystal coffins of the two skinwalkers. Once they were shunted into the Abyss, a notification appeared.
[Combat Summary:
Loathsome Void Spawn Larvae x56
Loathsome Void Spawn Immature x246
Loathsome Void Spawn x1487
Eldritch Skinwalker x2 (Imprisoned)
Eldritch Skinwalker x3
Total Experience gained: 3,515,570,388
Ostim?: +1,757,785,194
Ont?lin: +1,757,785,194
Resistance: Eldritch [I] (43->54)
Phoenix’s Rapture [G] (25->27)
True Song Genesis [M] (60->61)
Devouring Cacophony [S] (174->175)
Mana Finesse [S] (77->78)
Pain Eater (1) -> [Ap] (12)
Mental Hardening (1) -> [J] (29)
Note: That takes the cake for bad neighbourhoods, be careful about what makes the cut.]
No reward for stopping the Eldritch incursion because it’s not stopped.
Ignoring the emptiness beckoning her to drink from its oblivion to end her pain, Amdirlain teleported close to her entry point and let the aura and Flame Armour stop. Pulling her gear back out, she returned to the archives'' storage room. A song disrupted the portal that led below and, while listening around her, Amdirlain found twelve more to break. Fortunately, most were sitting behind more of Mor’lmes’ wards.
Cleansing herself of the distortion as best she could, Amdirlain restored J’s silver-furred form and headed upstairs. Taking her time, she listened to each ward recognising the key on her person, almost expecting one to sound an alarm. It was anticlimactic when she stepped out into the foyer with no alarm activating.
A dark brown-furred student, attired in leather pants and a dark red cloth shirt, stopped and looked her up and down. “Are you okay? Your pupils look funny, and you’re shaking.”
Amdirlain smiled happily, glad for her Charisma’s reduced effect. “I’m currently regretting not stopping for breakfast or lunch.”
It’s not letting me be a wallflower, but it''s no longer doing ''come hither''.
“Food crash is not a good thing to hit down in the archives. Do you need a guide to get to the nearest cafeteria?” enquired the student, shifting the battered rucksack he’d been carrying in one hand onto his back.
“Thanks for your concern, but I’ll be fine. I don’t live far,” declined Amdirlain, and she headed for the exit.
Once clear of the tower’s inner ward, Amdirlain teleported home.
Sarah let out a shout of glee and surged off the couch to embrace her. “You okay?”
“Recovering from a brush with stupidity, but I’ll be okay,” reassured Amdirlain, returning the hug.
“Tell me all about it,” insisted Sarah, nudging Amdirlain towards her usual couch.
“Where’s Kadaklan?” asked Amdirlain as she sat down.
Sarah smiled reassuringly and sat down beside her. “After the first hour, he said he couldn’t stand simply waiting and headed down to the law keepers to put things to rest. Said to contact him at the lab where he’d be making sure they hadn’t gone off the rails.”
“Well, cliff notes,” murmured Amdirlain, and she mentally sent the combat summary to Sarah.
“Your mental touch feels shaky,” critiqued Sarah. “Maybe let Mor’lmes know you mopped up his bad guys and take a few days off.”
“I looked into the main chamber’s shaft and glimpsed the Delirium of Darkness. That was enough to feel like it was trying to suck out my Soul,” breathed Amdirlain.
Sarah winced. “Yeah, you need to level your Phoenix’s Rapture higher to get better Mental Hardening.”
“I retook it before I went in; it''s now back up to Journeyman twenty-nine on top of Phoenix’s Rapture,” advised Amdirlain.
“Might seem like a waste, but how about you put points into it?”
Amdirlain shook her head. “How about I drink a bunch of Kadaklan’s tonics?”
“That would be fine if you’d wanted to level it before going in,” argued Sarah. “How about spending enough points to get Mental Hardening into Adept? It might settle the shakiness, as I don’t like how your mental touch felt.”
Amdirlain started to object but nodded and spent the twelve points.
[Mental Hardening [J] (29) -> [Ad] (1)]
Tipped over the threshold, she felt the temptation of oblivion retreat.
“Thanks, I’ll need to get that higher,” said Amdirlain, and she clasped Sarah’s hand. “Pushing to Adept rank took the pressure off.”
“You going to take a couple of days for yourself?” asked Sarah.
“A few days. I need to see what Jan’era is cooking up for my ‘farewell’ party.”
Sarah shrugged. “Or we could stay ‘retired’ for a bit. You can focus on setting up their demi-planes, smoothing out gods’ graves and not jumping back and forth between projects. You’re getting a lot of song practice out of those.”
“We are running on saved funds at present, and those won’t cover twenty to thirty years,” said Amdirlain with a frown. “Public persona remember? It won''t go well if I whistle up money that I can’t explain.”
“Please,” scoffed Sarah. “Your sales might have covered everything in the last few years, but we have other options. We’ll return to paying everything with Mana—high-level Bard and Artificer; no one will question it. That’s if Kadaklan doesn’t volunteer to be your sugar daddy.”
Frowning in concern, Amdirlain muttered. “What about your levelling, though? Is enchanting providing enough experience?”
“I’ll give you a materials list. Oh! Make me a demi-plane, please,” squealed Sarah. “I’ve got a list of things I’d like to eat.”
“Dragons!” huffed Amdirlain. “Fine, I’ll set up dinner for you, but you better be ready for my kaiju knockoffs.”
Sarah laughed tightly. “I wasn’t just talking about food.”
Amdirlain face-palmed. “I’m going to go cycle.”
“Stay a little longer,” Sarah said, holding onto her hand.
“Sorry I had you worried,” replied Amdirlain, and she settled back on the couch.
“Who said I was worried? I need a headrest,” retorted Sarah, and she promptly leant against Amdirlain’s shoulder. “I’m about to tell you something, and I don’t want you jumping up.”
Amdirlain chewed her lip in concern and nodded. “Okay,”
“Roher dropped by Xaos with Isa,” said Sarah. “You needed to hide the crystal a bit better.”
“Well, that cat is out of the bag,” groaned Amdirlain. “Why did they even go there?”
“Wanting to help with your project. Yeah, Isa messaged me and said she’ll listen whenever you want to talk about it,” advised Sarah. “They also repaired the crystal supports of your training tower there before they left.”
“What happened with the royals?”
“They took a stand between Roher and some unfriendly fire; they didn’t make it,” explained Sarah, and she looped an arm around Amdirlain. “The mess cost Roher an arm, and attempts to regenerate it haven’t yet taken hold.”
“But it shattered the oaths?” asked Amdirlain, pushing aside her concern over Roher’s injury.
Others with more medical experience will be looking at it.
“Yep, they had no living children after the dust settled, so the oaths went pop. The Lóm? have sworn off centralised authority,” explained Sarah. “I also learnt what they wanted Isa, and potentially you, to help with. They unleashed all the stored energy from the crystals. It''s a nice little twist on their barriers. It used the reserves to send out a pressure wave, obliterated millions of demons, and compressed enough rock to cause a Saturn-sized cavern in Ternòx. ”
“Fuck, I would have paid to see that,” huffed Amdirlain.
“Yes, please,” squeed Sarah. “I promise to respect you in the morning.”
Amdirlain huffed. “Not now, dear, I’ve got a headache.”
Ignoring Sarah''s gales of laughter, Amdirlain messaged Mor’lmes with details of the tunnel clearance and a promise to contact him ‘soon’.
* * * * *
When Amdirlain appeared outside Mor’lmes’ apartment door three days later, she felt much better. Even if it hadn''t been the rest Sarah would have preferred, it had been what Amdirlain needed. Completely disabling Phoenix’s Rapture had caused the first swallow of the potion she’d taken to hit like an express train, and enduring hours of agony searing through her spiritual net had boosted her Mental Hardening up forty levels.
When Phoenix’s Rapture was enabled in passive mode, she''d isolated and cleansed the stray temptations before the mental infection spread. Removing it from her mind and the synchronised memories in her Soul hadn’t triggered a single objection. Yet attempts to regain Protean still caused a spike of fear that rang against Mental Hardening.
Pressing the signal rune beside the door, Amdirlain waited and distractedly listened to the quick conversation inside.
Wha’sin opened the door, wearing a loose pale cream shirt and dark pants that made her dark blue fur pop. The shirt didn’t entirely hide her fourth-month bulge from the triplets. “J, this is a first.”
Her body was now all flesh and blood, the prosthetic arm dealt with before her pregnancy.
“You seem to like taking three days after events to contact us,” noted Mor’lmes from further down the corridor. That he was standing by their weapons rack was a coincidence, Amdirlain was sure.
“May I come in?” asked Amdirlain.
“I’m not stopping you,” replied Mor’lmes, and Wha’sin rolled her eyes.
And not inviting me in either is a good idea against some nasties that don’t like thresholds.
Wha’sin had already stepped back, and Amdirlain followed her inside and closed the door. “After holding off, you committed to parenthood in a big way.”
“That better not be a comment about my weight,” grumbled Wha’sin light-heartedly.
“The triplets are all healthy,” observed Amdirlain.
“Don’t tell me their genders,” blurted Wha’sin.
Amdirlain raised her hands. “Sorry for being intrusive, and I wasn’t offering a gender reveal.”
“You’re allowed to be a little nosey,” reassured Wha’sin as she led the way to the living room. “We wouldn’t have them without your grimoire. Can Mor’lmes get you a drink or snack?”
“I don’t need to eat, but thanks for the offer,” replied Amdirlain. “How’s progress?”
“You turn up without warning, and you want to cover the small stuff first?” grumped Mor’lmes.
“You sure you don’t want to trade him in for a happier mate?”
Wha’sin’s ears twitched, and her whiskers lifted. “He’s my grumpy cub.”
“Your choice. Well, you both already have the highlights,” countered Amdirlain. “I’d like to know how things have been with the observers since we last exchanged information.”
Wha’sin motioned Amdirlain towards the couches before settling on one closest to the dining table. It had an energy projector hidden down the side and let her cover the front door, kitchen, and the stairs to the apartment’s second level.
After Amdirlain picked a couch, Mor’lmes sat at the dining table guarding Wha’sin’s back.
“We’ve finished accounting for all the print runs of three of the seven cult texts that had Eldritch glyphs in them,” advised Mor’lmes. “Two of the books we’re missing a small number of texts, but it''s possible they were in destroyed vehicles or libraries. We’re sure the Spellclash manor would have had some of them, but -”
“Yeah, hard to sign off on ash,” allowed Amdirlain.
“Some of the remaining texts were shipped into the Matriarch’s dominion,” added Wha’sin. “They''re not responsive to official or civilian enquiries about matters in their lands. Lady Cla’nes’s contacts are trying to track the deliveries through their channels.”
Amdirlain wrinkled her nose at the thought of dealing with that stuffy lot. Especially after the lengths they''d taken to silence Am’s music—even trying to seize her for ''re-education''. “Maybe I can pry some information loose. I’m sure they’d like me to fix one of their gods’ graves next.”
“The velvet guild in the oligarchy has been helpful. They handed over some copies that ended up with their members and, via Lady Cla’nes, they’ve agreed to give access to scour their library,” continued Mor’lmes.
“I’m sure someone will have fun with all the sex magic texts, lots of diagrams to check,” quipped Amdirlain. “Remind those who take that assignment that just because it challenges their tastes and mind doesn’t mean it is an Eldritch glyph. I would hate for them to burn all the diagrams of fun sex positions.”
Wha’sin suppressed a snort of laughter. “What’s the situation beneath the campus grounds? Besides all the things you killed.”
“I’ve detected no further movements in the tunnel and added proximity sensors around the sleeping entity,” advised Amdirlain. Creating an illusion of the tunnels and the campus buildings, Amdirlain sighed. “I don’t suppose it''s possible to evacuate the Triumvirate Campus completely?”
Looking over Amdirlain’s diagram, Mor’lmes huffed in dissatisfaction. “What does that gain you, and how much panic do you want to spread? There are some dormitory buildings on campus grounds, and while few tunnels are close to them, that isn’t the case with the corrupted stone.”
“The whole thing is an infection that will continue to spread corruption,” stated Amdirlain.
“What about putting layers of dimensional barriers around the current corruption?”
“The ground above could sink,” cautioned Amdirlain.
Mor’lmes drew a line through the illusion with his fingertip above the highest point of the corrupted stone. “Not if there was a Gate that was, say, face down on the rock surface of a demi-plane or one filled with stone completely.”
Adjusting the illusion, Amdirlain incorporated his line and continued it to complete a cube around the corrupted stone.
“That is a far more extensive Gate than I’d intended to propose,” observed Mor’lmes.
“A one-way Gate, and if there is solid matter on the other side, nothing can pass through,” agreed Amdirlain. “There are more than a few problems. One, it''s a permanent connection; two, we’d need another demi-plane for the corruption to expand into, and three, something might find either of those demi-planes.”
“What if it''s not permanent?” asked Wha’sin. “You said you vented the dust into space. Is it possible to set up this cube to cut it off, then let the corrupted stone slide through a Gate into space?”
“Ejecting it into space is a bad idea, same with a demi-plane, because of their nature,” advised Amdirlain, and she beamed. “However, I know a few dead worlds. I’ll park this thing on one of them, and then once I’m stronger, I can see about dealing with it permanently. I’ll let you know as soon as it''s off your world.”
“So you didn’t need the campus evacuated,” commented Mor’lmes.
Amdirlain huffed. “I prefer not to risk lives when I don’t have to, and plans can often go astray. However, panic could cause injuries, so I’ll take extreme precautions before construction.”
Rising, Amdirlain winked and gave Wha’sin a mental warning before she teleported through the wards Mor’lmes had set up to prevent it.