Chapter 115: Book 2: Hollow

Chapter 115: Book 2: Hollow

I haven't looped. I think.

The I think is kind of a weird qualifier, I know. I'm pretty sure I'm not dead, but I'm also not entirely convinced I'm still alive. Best guess is that I'm in some kind of coma, or otherwise in some sort of transitional state, like when I managed my first Phase-Shift or when I'm picking out an Inspiration with Gheraa. Everything around me is a dull, drab gray, like I'm sitting in a colorless, Firmament-less Void.

I'm conscious, at least. So that's nice. The Interface feels far away from my grasp at the moment, and every attempt I make to call it up fails completely. The same goes for any attempt to use a skill, or to pull on my link with Ahkelios, or even to do something as basic as move around—there isn't really a ground for my feet to catch on, and even if there were, there's no sensation of inertia or landmark to tell me if I'm successfully moving.

The isolation is suffocating. I'm trying very hard not to panic. It's working. Mostly.

"We have to stop meeting like this," a voice sounds out. I whirl around to find Gheraa leaning against... well, nothing, in standard Gheraa fare. His back is pressed against a wall that isn't there, and he's holding a white cane trimmed with gold; he twirls it around casually, tapping the tip of the cane on the also-nonexistent floor and producing an oddly metallic ting.

I can't deny I'm relieved to see him, even if I have no idea what he's talking about. "This is the first time we're meeting like this," I point out.

"And it should be the last!" Gheraa points his cane at me. "This is incredibly dangerous. But also incredibly convenient, so good job doing whatever you did to trigger this."

"I have no idea what I did to trigger this." Besides exhausting myself mid-fight and passing out immediately after, which isn't something I'm planning on doing again anytime soon. There's a part of me that's tense about this—I don't know what state the world is in. I don't know how I've left things.

I don't know how long I've been like this.

Gheraa looks around. "Firmament exhaustion," he says after a moment. He rubs his fingers together like he's feeling for the texture in the air, scanning for something I can't see or sense—not in the state I'm in, anyway. "You pushed that Warpstep a lot farther than you should have. And... hm. There's something else."

"I've Warpstepped a lot farther than that without any problems," I say.

"Yes, but this time, you were in a corridor perforated by spatial distortions," Gheraa says. He tries to rap me on the head with his cane, but I dodge out of the way and glare at him; he just grins at me. "You're lucky the Interface is so adaptable or you would've torn yourself in half."

"...You sound like you're speaking from experience." I eye Gheraa carefully.

"Maybe, maybe not!" Gheraa says, with just a little too much cheer in his voice. "But be careful using Warpstep against anyone that can mess with space. Actually, just be careful with spatial movement skills in general. You still have to fold all the space between you and your target with your Firmament. What do you think happens if that spatial tunnel gets messed with?"

"Presumably the loop resets," I say, because that's a little more pleasant of a thought than getting torn in half by a misplaced teleport.

Gheraa just grins at me, falling back into a nonexistent chair and crossing one leg over the other. "The Interface can correct for it," he says. "It's why the thing exists—or part of the reason, anyway. You get to fire off the skill and not worry about it. But it's going to use much more Firmament than it should, because you're asking the Interface to compensate for something it shouldn't have to compensate for. A single spatial distortion in the way means part of your body might have to travel several times farther than a different part of your body."

He's got a point—I should've been more aware of what this Remnant was capable of and how it might interact with my skills. I shake my head and sigh. "How long have I been out, Gheraa?"

"Not long. About two minutes." Gheraa examines me for a moment. "You're worried."

"And I should be." I breathe out. "But I'm guessing there's no way to just wake up."

"Not quickly. And there are things we need to do before then." Gheraa's expression settles into something more serious, the faux-mirth fading away into something more grim.

"What do you mean?" I ask. Gheraa eyes me for a moment, then goes back to examining those invisible threads in the air, picking through them with his fingers and eventually shaking his head.

"You wouldn't have been pulled here if all that happened was some Firmament strain. Not unless you're experiencing ongoing Firmament strain, and not unless there's a threat the Interface's default settings can't protect from you."

...Ongoing? "I'm not using any skills right now," I say. As far as I know, anyway.

"You are. You're just not aware of it." Gheraa glances around, then tries a bright smile that I don't buy for a second. "But like I said, this is convenient! Good job. Right now, no one can see what you're doing, not even me. We can talk in perfect privacy."

I narrow my eyes. "Hold on. What do you mean, not even you?"

"Oh, uh, right. I guess I haven't actually explained what's happening." Gheraa scratches the back of his head in a decidedly human gesture. "You'll remember I told you I needed to prepare for our next meeting. Well, I did. This is the result of that preparation. We needed a way to talk privately, and this is the only way I could think to do it. There are no eyes on us right now—no Integrator can see what we're doing, including my real self."

"Your... real self." I repeat the words with a small amount of skepticism; this Gheraa seems as real as any version of him I've ever spoken to. "I'm talking to a fake version of you?"

"Well, depending on what you think of as fake, yes," Gheraa confirms, ignoring said skepticism. "But don't call me that or you'll hurt my feelings."

"How dangerous is he?" If he's making moves against me already, I'm going to have to face him whether I like it or not. I'll need to be prepared. One more thing to do in a steadily-growing list.

"Whatever you're thinking he can do, it's probably worse," Gheraa says. "He's gotten a skill from the Interface that we've never seen before. There are Integrators worried about what he's capable of. He might not be anywhere near being able to affect any of us, but he could mess with our plans, if he wanted to."

"And what can he do, exactly?"

"His skills revolve around manipulation and control," Gheraa says. "But you've probably figured that out already, and we've seen that before. There are ways to defend against mind-affecting Firmament. The problem with Teluwat is what happens afterward when he uses his main skill—it's called Rewritten Truth."

Gheraa gestures. Dark Firmament spreads out from his fingertips, spreading into the air like the branches of a tree. "Whatever new reality he enforces on someone under his control spreads. Like a sickness made of Firmament, infecting everything else it touches."

I stare at the slowly-expanding Firmament and feel myself taking a step back, in spite of myself. "What does that mean, exactly? He makes someone believe something and it becomes true?"

"Essentially." Gheraa's expression darkens slightly. "There are limitations, but nothing we've been able to clearly define. It's a Firmament-based skill, so anyone capable of working with Firmament can resist it. Objects that don't rely on Firmament are relatively immune. But Firmament is imbued into everything, including most objects and buildings—Rewritten Truth can alter all those things."

"That's..."

"I know." Gheraa closes his fist, and the tree of Firmament shatters, scattering into the void. "We've never seen skills like that before. But that's true for a lot of the new skills coming out of the Interface—that Time Punch skill of yours, for example."

"Time Punch isn't nearly as ridiculous as Rewritten Truth," I say with a grimace. I can't even think of a way to counter that. If what Gheraa says is true, then Teluwat's limitations are nearly nonexistent—his skills take advantage of the nature and prevalence of Firmament. Maybe if I could take advantage of the loops in some way.

...but now that I think about it, I might not be the only one able to take advantage of those loops.

The loop takes precedence over most alterations, but not all of them. Changes to the Firmament of people tend to stick across loops, while anything altered in objects and buildings doesn't seem to. It's the reason Guard's injuries were sustained across loops—the reason Whisper panics at the start of every loop.

A realization hits.

"Wait," I say. "Firmament changes to people are retained across loops, right?"

"Yes." Gheraa frowns. "Why?"

"Because," I say, "if Teluwat's figured that out..."

There's a beat, and then Gheraa's eyes narrow. "Then he's most likely using your loops to spread his control."

"Yup." The more I think about it, the more sense it makes—it even explains the sudden appearance of Whisper's agents under Teluwat's control. The question is how long it takes him to realize that the loops are running and begin his work. It can't be at the start of every loop; without outside factors like Naru learning about a Hotspot to investigate or Guard's sudden collapse, the Hestian Trialgoers don't seem automatically alerted to the fact that a Trial has begun.

"The Integrators won't like it, but they won't help," Gheraa says, frowning in thought. "They can't. Not with any Trial, and not with yours especially."

That figures. I'll have to work out some kind of counter to Teluwat on my own, then. The skill can't be insurmountable—even Gheraa thinks it has limitations, even if he doesn't know what those limitations are.

So I'll just have to work it out for myself.

"Sounds like it's time for you to tell me what the Trials are for," I say. "Especially if you're implying there's somethin special about my Trial."

"It is. And it's time for you to learn the true nature of Firmament," Gheraa says. He takes a breath, as if considering what he's about to say, and then nods to himself. "...You're going to need to be stronger. A lot stronger. So I'm going to use what I have left to train you, and as soon as we're done, I'm going to forcibly end this loop. It's too risky for you to stay in it while Teluwat is spreading his influence around."

I grit my teeth—I don't like that idea, considering how much I still have to do this loop. "Only if I can't figure something else out," I say. "I can end the loop on my own if I need to. Or with Ahkelios's help."

"Fine," Gheraa says. I notice he doesn't fight me on it. His hands are still shaking, too. How much is he really feeling, under all that faux cheer and showboating? Most of it has melted away over the course of this conversation, but I still see the little subconscious gestures, the flourishes he automatically adds to his movements and the forced smile he fixes on his face.

I sigh.

Mind Vault or not, I want to see what's going on with my body for myself. I close my eyes, trying to sense where I am, trying to connect to my body and its sense of Firmament.

I can feel Gheraa watching me. "Well?" I speak without opening my eyes. "What are the Trials really for?"