Andar knew that while many of the things he was witnessing here might be true, this was most likely all that his consciousness could interpret. This drew his desire to understand to the fore, and Andar could not help but fall into the motions of these hands; he believed he was glimpsing eternity in them.
"Hand the tweezers; I cannot get to the core of her soul without damaging too much of its fragile structure; a fascinating matrix shields it, nothing that these present iterations should be capable of, clear proof of tampering, how fascinating."
It took a mont for Andar to feel a chill running down his spine. He dragged his eyes against the hands that held him spellbound and looked up to see the man staring at him, and he motioned with his eyes,
"The tweezers are there beside you; hand them over. This structure will not last forever, and I would rather not dig it out of your soul. Unlike an Old One, your soul is still too fragile for an invasive procedure like this."
Andar felt a Waring vibration from Aetherius, and he looked down to see hovering a few feet from his chest; one of the Frozen hands erging from this man's back was waiting, palm spread open, and Andar had not even seen how that movent had happened.
His senses reached towards his side, where a small altar had appeared without his notice, and Andar recognized several tools. Most were used in the Immortal Arts, but so were strange, with forms that seed to make no sense. These alien tools did not seem aningless; in fact, as he looked at them, it appeared that he was finally seeing the complete toolkits of the Immortal Arts.
A series of snaps made him look at the frozen hand in front of his chest. The fingers wriggled in impatience, causing the air around them to crackle like mini thunder strikes erging around the fingers from its slight motion.
Andar knew how dense his surroundings were, and he was only standing here because of Aetherius; if this finger could shake this space to the extent it was cracking, he would have to give his all to defend against a minor blow from them. This single frozen hand was clear proof that this man could effortlessly kill him.
Instinct born out of centuries of studying the Immortal Arts under various masters surged through his body, and Andar sent out a burst of Intent, wrapping it around the requested tweezers and floating it to the frozen hand. An apprentice did not delay the works of the master, especially when it seed to be crucial. Andar did not bother to think of the reason he was ant to fetch the tools, as he knew that every action made by this man served a purpose.
The frozen hand grabbed the tweezers out of the air, and in the next mont, the man in front of him was holding them, his focus back on his work. Andar could no longer discern any of the hand's movents as it was now buried deeper inside Revah's chest.
He heard a slight sound, almost like the tiny whisper of the breeze in the distance, and Andar turned to Revah's slack face. Her milky eyes… twitched. The realization dawned on him that this Magus was not dead. His gaze traveled to all the other dais inside the cave, and he could detect subtle movents from all of them.
The sound he heard was repeated, almost like a strangled moan, and he would have sworn that her eyes shifted a bit. Maybe it was because whatever act this man was making inside Revah's body was rocking her, and he could not help but question how he could reduce Old Ones to the level of mortals.
As he stood here, Andar realized a simple and absolute truth: He was out of his league.
He could fight an Old One, even one as strong as Endirius, but Andar could not fight who was standing here; whoever this was, they were not a Mage.
A dry chuckle suddenly erged from the man who was fiddling with the corpse of Revah; he did not turn away from his work as he asked Andar,
"Your consciousness power is impressive; most only see what they believe to be the truth, and I usually let them. However, I am curious about this consciousness of yours. Does it co from that amazing treasure you hold, or is its foundation much more substantial than that?"
Andar blinked, a chill running down his spine; his mouth was dry as if no drop of water had touched his tongue for a million years. His voice when he replied sounded incredibly weak, but that was the best that he could do,
"You are not the Supre Mage Endirius."
The man paused for a mont before he continued whatever he was doing inside the corpse,
"I showed you Endirius, the Supre Mage, but your consciousness rejected it. Do not bla for your stubbornness. Hand the scalpel; I think I have found the little mouse hiding inside her."
Andar's consciousness moved almost automatically as it wrapped around the scalpel and placed it on the frozen hand that appeared before him, and he watched as the man began to cut deeper inside Revah's body, and after a while, he began to speak,
"When I made the civilization of Mages, I knew there would be eyes on my work. It was the reason I made them."
A frozen hand gestured at the bodies that were laid around him, and he began to point towards the different bodies as he spoke,
"They were made to never cross the seventh-dinsional level, yet they are all Old Ones. Fascinating and all quite boring, it is as if they don't know how to use their influence except like a hamr. The Pris disappoints in strange ways. However, this one, Revah, the modification to her soul, is quite interesting. Your father, Romion, is an impressive mind."
Andar stepped back; he could not help himself; the peculiar sensation of being entirely seen through was highly uncomfortable,
"You don't have to worry, Andar, my quarrels are not with you," the man shrugged, "Even if I wanted to stand against you, that action would be useless because you are too weak. Oh, and when you crossed the barrier, the Will of your father inside of you was stripped away. In this place, the only power under the heavens is mine."
Reviews
All reviews (0)