Entree Keys
Year 152
Lilies introduced to an interesting new friend. It was a massive turtle, the size of a bus, that sohow managed to secretly swim through the rivers and lakes. I had eyes and ears, but in the water, it still managed to evade my detection.
It clearly had so skills, and the way it communicated was strange.The turtle stopped at the side of the lake, and touched one of Lilies floating platforms. It seed to use Lilies way of communication.
> I am Vallasira, pleased to et you, Aeon. <
It was a magical turtle or tortoise thing, resembling a Zaratan, but too small to be one. But I asked to be sure.
> Yes, I am a young Zaratan. It is a common question, and I have lived for as long as Lilies. We heard of your search for tales of the sea, and I am here to answer what I can. It is not often that one of the spirits of the land seeks out the spirits of the sea. <
Is there a catch? With Lilies, there wasnt any. Lilies was just willing to share, especially with soone like whom they view as an equal.
> So long as we are never hunted on your lands and your rivers, that is good enough. <
I said.
> It is so. It seems you seek the origins of the gods? <
They lived so long, surely there are ways...
> We do what spirits of our kind do. We swim to other worlds where the demons cannot follow. <
I felt like that turtle just dropped a bombshell on . So there clearly are other worlds, and not only that, the turtle is able to go there!
It paused montarily > We can only carry what that can fit on our backs, and our void mana determines how often we can go and what we can take. For spirits of you power... we cannot do so. <
Void mana. Where have I heard that before... Ah. That princess from so many many years ago. So that princess was headed in the right direction...
> And we have ti. < Vallasira spoke, he, or it, floated on the shores of Lilies lake. I made a large wall of trees so that he would not be seen, and then added a layer of [camouflage] and [mist]. Here was a creature who travelled to other worlds, and it would not be .
Fuck. So there are multiple worlds with similar problems. But also, there is a way to escape. Patreecks idea of hiding the world, or sohow moving the world away has rit.
> We believe they are creatures or beings that reached a certain yet unknown high level, and obtained the 2nd tier of the system. We also speculate there is either a system that existed above this one, or a tier to the current system. In any case, the gods have access to a higher set of powers and rights. We do not know how to get there, and those who have, could not reveal it to us. <
An admin system, or console access, isnt it? Mozart referred to himself as administrator. Maybe its just a set of administrator passwords which granted them access to that system.
> We suspect so, though their nas are different across worlds. <
> Certainly. Zaratans et each other to mate, to raise our eggs and our young, and discuss the matters of our safety, and of the multiverse. >
> As Zaratans of the sea, we know little of these otherworldly invaders. They have a howorld, or a chain of worlds sowhere, but their world lacks seas, rivers or lakes, so we cannot create the interplanar mist and swim there. So... we dont know beyond that, and who controls them there. Our great elder once tried to stop the demons, but the Gods puppets turned on our elder. <
A waterless world. I see. Also, these interplanar turtles need large bodies of water to move around worlds? Thats a rather odd restriction to their power.
> Our abilities have adapted us to travelling to other worlds, and would not be useful to you. Large quantities of Void Mana is the first step to any interplanar travel. <
Void mana. How do I get that?
It seed the turtle read my mind. > Void Mana requires one to dabble in higher magics, or, if you have it naturally. Like us. <
Wait, does this also imply that the Spirit Trees in those stories may actually have Void Mana instead of Star Mana? Perhaps, it is a path along the road of the domains, that I may have one of those choices in the future?
I would presu that there have to be further domain choices, that Level 150 isnt the only ti one chooses their domain. Given that my first domain choice happened at Level 150, its possible that the next domain choice happens at either Level 200, Level 250 or Level 300. If Level 150 was the one and only domain choice, then I may be quite fucked.
The turtle was silent for a mont, then answered. > No. <
Hmm. That ant a high level is not really necessary to get the power to travel to other worlds. Even that princess managed to expose herself to void mana, she was not higher than Level 50 then. So there are ways to access Void Mana. Perhaps even naturally. Are there plants that naturally produce void mana? If I could create a farm of such trees or plants...
The turtle just shook its massive head. It probably didnt know. Not that I can bla them. What else did I want to know? Uh. But already I have a lot to work with.
> Elevated authority in a specified field of the system. <
Ah darn. The system works like users making and interacting with it, and domain powers are super-user rights? Gods eventually reach admin rights? But what is this... system? Are gods the creators of it, or are they just glorified administrators? If there are just administrators, surely the creator must be a lot more powerful? The turtle left after a while, but it promised to return again soday.
-
We wish to reopen diplomatic relationships, discreetly. An Aiva Envoy arrived on our shores, disguised as a regular rchant. They t with an audience of the Representatives, and Kavio. Kavio was about to retire after decades at the helm, to be replaced by one of the representatives. They had a mini-election to select the Representative Leader.
And why would we even bother? Kavio barked, his mood was rather foul. Another Lord in the eting quickly intervened.
Representative Leader Kavio, wait. Lets hear him out.
The Temple of Aiva does not believe or participate in the slander against Aeon or the Central Continent. Absolute rubbish. All the evidence collected so far, its quite clear Aivan Church participated in the propaganda.
Liars. They are liars. I whispered to Kavios ears, and he knows it too. After all, we did not sit idle after the blockade was broken. The restoration of our eyes and ears in these hostile lands were one of the great priorities since then.
Lies, envoy. Kavio repeated. Let it be known that we do not appreciate the lies.
The envoy gulped. Patreeck used his mind reading abilities. The envoy screwed up anyway, he knew it was a lie too, but he was confident. He had a skill to resist mind reading, but he was horribly underleveled against Patreeck. The Aivan Temple did want to open diplomatic relations, but the leadership hoped to extort so kind of agreent or aid, since they had a lot of damage to undo.
Aeon notes you did not co to our shores in good faith. This negotiation is over. Kavio sent him off. The representatives were baffled. Thank your foolish gods that we do not send you back in a body bag.
The envoy left at haste.
-
One of the Valthorns, without the use of my class seeds, managed to upgrade his own class to [Archmage]. [Archmage] has been one of those elusive classes to create, though I did have archmage classes obtained from the dead.
I would say the magic of the Central Continent is not significantly more advanced than the other continents. Magic research is mostly the pursuit of eccentric individuals, so, while the Central Continent is safer than the other continents, and my various abilities did seem to improve the speed of gaining levels, they still tend to plateau. To summarise, with magic, what I had were [mages] of a high level, but did not have particularly unique abilities.
The process of creating or inventing new spells or new ways of using existing spells, as it is, remains the domain of the eccentric, or otherwise, luck.
A [Mage] is soone who taps into the mana of the world, and casts spells. A spell can be both a [skill] and not a skill. That ant, it is possible for a mage to read an instruction of how to cast [fireball], and cast the spell, [fireball], without having the skill [fireball]. Having the skill, of course, ant the mage could cast the sa spell faster, quicker, stronger and with less mana cost.
A mage therefore learns to cast a spell, and with sufficient practice, gains the [skill] reflecting that said spell, and thus becos more competent and powerful. Mages also gain a range of support skills throughout their careers, such as mana-cost reduction skills, passive mana regeneration skills, or elental boosts and discounts.
The invention of new spells, however, is mostly bouts of madness. A mage tries to mix components of the spells together, in hopes of creating sothing new. Sotis they succeed, sotis they fail. A good healer, like myself, ant that they are more likely to survive failures and have the chance to try again. This, of course, supports the persistent mages, those who work hard and experint constantly. They have so successes, but they will see a lot more failures.
The conversation with the zaratan left my mind spinning, and my artificial minds were hard at work processing the ideas. There are ways to travel across worlds. Void mana.
If anything, I now had to consider sponsoring the mages and wizards in our care to dabble in void mana, figure out how that princess managed to do so. Its a risky one, clearly playing with void mana incorrectly would destroy ones soul spring.
Over the decades, my library of books and tos have grown massively. I had my researchers and mages run through them, to find the clues of Void Magic.
I recall so words back when Madeus still lived. The tos of the mad-hero Arsene Emir. I quickly called on the Valthorns to locate it. It took a few months, but the tos and writings of the mad-hero were duplicated many, many tis, so we managed to retrieve a few copies. So of the surviving kingdoms on the Central Continent had a copy in their own personal libraries.
Void mana. Exposure to it would cause visions and nightmares of otherworldly horrors.
Back then, it was explained to that Void Mana was a raw primordial form of mana. Is that explanation then still true?
Quite a few of the mages professed their reluctance to experint on void mana. It seed that the history of man is littered with mages killing themselves through incorrect use of void mana, and no one has figured out how to correctly use them in the first place.
Knowledge of void mana isnt entirely rare, and is used mostly as a reminder of bad magical practices.
So of the mages comnted that void mana can be collected, in small amounts, by way of runic formations. However, the runic formations usually must be located high above the ground, usually in towers or tall secluded places that are exposed to the night sky, and a large anti-magic barrier must be present, such that the runic formation is clear of all other mana. Then it is a matter of waiting and luck. Sotis, the runic formations will collect a small bit of void mana. Most of the ti, nothing. Collecting void mana when the two suns are present is impossible as the light will cause the void mana to decay.
Of course, their comnts were very strange, so points seed to contradict my existing knowledge, and I believe theres quite a bit of misinformation in that knowhow.
What is void mana?
I asked Lilies.
> So say it is always around us, but just undetected. So co across them purely by luck. <
I have an entire continent. Surely if it is luck, the statistics would point to having seen it already.
> Perhaps it is invisible to you, as you rely on Spirit Vision. <
...fuck.
-
Year 153
There was not much ti to rest, as I saw, we saw rifts opening throughout the central continent. It was a magically fascinating thing to see, to see space and reality crumble and break apart to reveal these gashes in space.
We redirected all the magical sensors and labs to the rifts, and wondered whether the demons use void mana too, or perhaps they have so substitute for it.
Are the rifts void mana?
Aeon. Demons spotted on our continent. Your command? Kavio and Valthorns ca to et.
Ringfence all the rifts, and let our forces fight them. Naturally, what else is there to do against demons? We should aim to take this opportunity to level up the forces. Alert to all demon champions.
As you command.
So of the smaller rifts spawned only ordinary demons. The demons resembled large skeletal structures, a bit more like animated skeleton animals with so dried flesh. From this alone Im predicted an undead-type demon king.
Since it wasnt a problem to suppress the rifts, Ive started setting up labs closer to the rifts, hoping that my sensors will figure out what they are.
Has anyone ever touched a rift? I asked the entire council and the Valthorns.
Uh... not that we know of.
What if we touched the rift?
There was silence. I decided to try, and on one of the smallest rifts, a bunch of vines and roots reached out and attempted to hold the rifts. It was weird. The rifts seed to be both a physical and magical thing, and alternated between the two. It felt like touching a floating snowflake that promptly turned into a puddle of water.
There was a... frequency. I could feel it, the way the energy of the rift ebbed back and forth. I instinctively attempted to match its resonance.
Master, the vines went through. Patreeck noted.
What. The vines got to the other side of the rift, I could still feel them, and it could go through if the magical pulse was at the right regularity. There was a sensation of incredible dryness, my vines had to draw more water from the network. Sand. Rocks. But very, very dry.
About an hour into it, the demons seed to realise, the small rift quickly closed and cut off my vines, now left on the other side.
Did you see or feel anything? I asked Patreeck. Patreeck had used my [eye] ability on the vines, to see whats on the other side. Patreeck gave a series of images, it felt like I was looking through the eyes of the mars rovers, an alien world filled with massive spires and large, red crystals. An army waited at the other side.
The vines eye turned and looked back at the rift. We saw a large ring-shaped gate structure, and the rift in it. Around the platform of the gate were six massive arrays of reddish-black stone. It glowed in both red and a black-ish color, at intervals. There were also more of those red crystals, further out, connected by so strange chains.
The demons then spotted the vine, and the portal promptly closed. That was the end of it.
But I saw enough. Demons. Alien worlds. Gates that open the rifts itself. Could I tamper with the rift next ti?
Spaizzer
Due to my present overwhelming workload and life generally, I've decided to take one week off. There will be no chapters on 2 March 2021. I will resu posting on 9 March 2021 (or 10 March 2021 depending on where you are in the world.)
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