Chapter 2151

Chapter 2151

On the morning of the ninth day of this relative peace, Randidly received a handwritten note from Mae Myrna. He sat in the renovated kitchen of the farmhouse with light filtering through the wide windows, sipping at the heavily lemoned ice tea which Jotem was now addicted. His fingers traced the curling letters oddly touched by the note, even if he felt uneasy at the message.

Dear Nether King.

I’ve been feeling quite strange lately, after allowing Westrisser to help me tune my image. Powerful, I believe, but some of that seems to be turned inward in an unpredictable manner. I do not believe Westrisser would be purposefully malicious; he seemed to take the bond of pupil and teacher very seriously, showing no deviation in the process or goal even after you and Elhume destroyed a neighborhood. Yet it also strikes me that he is not infallible.

The Patron of Feathers can’t quite put her finger on the source of the deviation, but I suspect its because Westrisser has been teaching me Nether principles to incorporate into my image. There is a dangerous resonance in matching Aether with Nether, even hastily.

I always knew we had encountered each other for a reason; perhaps this difficult is it. I know you possess quite a working understanding of Aether as well. Please, could you spare some time to come to Malloon and investigate the strangeness in my image?

I feel poised above a cliff. It is not in my nature to hesitate long, but the consequences of moving hastily give me pause.

Sincerely,

Mae Myrna

Randidly methodically folded the letter and stored it within an interspatial ring. It served as an obvious call to action. Chewing on his lip thoughtfully, he went to the window. Truth be told, he didn’t want to draw attention to himself yet. Elhume and most of the Patrons remained abroad. Word had spread throughout Malloon and the surrounding areas that Fatia Cerulean had arrived in the city. The ominous truth of this news was that Randidly didn’t sense anything different. Perhaps because of the second Aether powerhouse in the city, Nether King Bleak Sky had also made himself scarce.

Randidly twisted his lips. On the one hand, he worried this was a trap. On the other, all he had to do was look at the skies above Malloon to see the chaotic whirlpool of significance beginning to congregate. Based on the rabid energy discharge from the significance and the tremors running through the memory that no one else seemed ot feel, something was coming. His Nether Core revved in his chest, but it did little to stabilize the memory.

And when he looked at the whirlpool for a long time, he noticed a jerkiness he had only seen once before, in that strange little monologue by the Patron of the Borrowed. Something that hadn’t happened in the real version of events was about to happen, or the memory was trying to correct itself. There was a strain on the memory associated with this, but not as much as Randidly had experienced a few times before.

Randidly licked his lips. “The other possibility... something within the memory is happening too early, due to my interference.”

After a few seconds of hesitation, Randidly shook his head. “I still think we are too early to begin thinking about integrating Aether and Nether. Maybe after I see more Nether Kings of the past in action-”

“Not that,” Neveah shook her head. Her eyes were firm. “I want to begin the process of receiving formal Phaea from individuals in the Alpha Cosmos. Not everyone, but en mass. I’m thinking of tying it to enrollment in Kharon Academy, now that it has soundly marked its capability above the other imitation schools that have sprung up on Expira.”

Randidly wondered about the story behind Neveah’s confidence in Kharon Academy, but knew it was likely a distraction for another time. Still, he hesitated. His mind turned over the process and possibilities. “I can see the use, but it would be a weight against me now. We could do a few trial runs to ascertain whether Classes or Levels impact the burden on the body, but too many bodies will affect even me.”

“You forget our greatest advantage,” Neveah chided, her eyes crinkling. “To your credit, I think; you never wish to give to others burden you could bear. But we are not separate entities, just separate manifestations of an allied stubbornness.”

Randidly blinked. “You want to handle the burden of the Phaea and just feed me the power?”

“My body is not so overwhelming as yours, but I’m stronger than anyone else in the modern Nexus,” Neveah justified. She stretched out an arm and splayed out her fingers. “I didn’t notice it at first, but your evolved Stats are beginning to filter across to me. Slowly, they grow, and I think their ends will be different, but my Control recently morphed into Sentinel’s Watchfulness, a Rare Stat. I expect it will continue to climb, with the physical Stats soon to follow. Besides, I don’t fight like you do. The extra weight will just add extra gravitas to me in my day-to-day activities.”

Randidly’s lips quirked up at the attempted humor, but already Nether stirred in his chest in response to her suggestion. After a beat of consideration, he shook his head. “In theory, it’s a good idea. But even if we are Soulbound, that’s not how Nether works. History and connection, significance and faith. Cheating the burden like this will probably lessen the well of power I siphon. If we dodge the price, the benefit won’t bother to show up.”

“Then we split the burden,” Neveah countered. And from the familiarity of the words, Randidly realized this had been her aim the entire time.

He pursed his lips. “You could have just asked for this from the start. But why do you think the Phaea is so important? The power we would gain from them would probably be very slow in coming. Perhaps even so slow it won’t have accumulated enough by the time I finish in the memory and head back to the Nexus proper.”

“Because I don’t think the use of Phaea comes from that power, but from the channel that brings it,” Neveah said. She shrugged her shoulders. “You have been putting out fires for so long, you might not have even recognized when certain areas become abruptly less incendiary. But since you’ve received the Phaea of Demetrius, the subconscious horrors of the Alpha Cosmos haven’t shown any sign of condensing around another of your flaws. The power just pools around that channel. Eventually, it will again become problematic, but not if we create more channels. And we shouldn’t forget that we don’t understand the roles of the different Nether types very well.”

“Phaea might be part of an entirely other sort of scaffolding,” Randidly hummed to himself as he picked up on her point. His Nether Core hummed back in confirmation. This time, he accepted her suggestion.

A few hours before noon, he set off for Malloon to answer the Patron of Truth’s call for help. Meanwhile, Neveah returned to within his Alpha Cosmos, earning a few grumbling shudders from the memory. Deep within his body, more Phaea would be soon given. Although he did not know exactly what lay on the Path, he walked toward becoming a true Nether King.