The light of the candle died out, and Scandar started telling his story in complete darkness, only shrouded by the light of the moon.
"Many, many millennia ago, Zomearon was just an ordinary student,"
"He lived in a great city conjoined by several islands, known only now as The City of Atlas,"
Scandar explained. "This city was vibrant, their citizens used technology like nothing you've ever seen, and they were able to commune with earth magic unlike anything anyone has ever seen."
"Before long - they discovered subterranean caves underneath their islands, in them, they found four crystals, white in color inside, and shimmer outside of them, all the colors of the rainbow, they glowed with immense power, the people of Atlas knew if they studied them, they could harness their power."
"They needed a mage who knew their way around new types of magic, so their king came to only one conclusion, get Zomearon to lead a research team into this matter,"
"Why Zomearon?" he read my mind.
"Because he was the only one who could truly commune with the earth spirit, time and time again he had proven that only he knew of ways to make such magic work,"
"So they put a team together and started researching the crystals below the sea,"
"The crystals were big enough to fill out a cave so big, you could fit two earths in there, and they found four of them," continued Scandar. I wanted to listen to more.
"It was almost comical, within the week - Zomearon found an entrance to the void, that's where his corruption started, where the madness crept in,"
"The void is not just something to commune dark magic from, it's a place, where everything and nothing exists all at once, it's a parasite to the crystals. Something that latched to them as they migrated from one planet to another."
"The crystals?!" I asked.
"That's right the crystals voyage through space, collecting information and arriving on planets until they get to interact with life, once the crystals run out of energy or well mana, they'll travel to the stars only to find voyage a new."
"So what does any of this have to do with the void and Zomearon?"
"Hold on - I'm getting there," he exclaimed.
"Zomearon was corrupted by the void, he was bought with pragmatic excuses of money, riches and fame, power. And he was shown the madness because he was such a great mage, he communed with the earth spirit to seal it away inside of his mind, and so he consumed great power from the void, with little to no repercussion,"
I heard a faint knocking, somewhere in the room, that's weird… The doors were all open.
Was Sybil being polite because of Scandar?
What is it, Sibyl
>My apologies, but I believe I might want to conjure about this earth spirit he speaks of.
Oh yeah, and what's that?
>Cronus does not have one such earth spirit. Cronus has mana leylines that emanate from its core.
>What you experience as earth magic, is only but a taste of the planet's core energy.
>Much like the sun god you bestowed upon this local cluster.
>Cronus has one too, inside the planet.
>I believe it's a human spirit, dormant but active.
>This earth spirit, user Scandar speaks off, might be just another A.I.
Sibyl explained.
"You listening?" said Scandar to the both of us. Dragan and I looked at each other like we knew something was up.
"Yeah go on Dad - sorry," said Dragan. Thankfully Scandar was too drunk to notice that we were both lost in thought. I beaconed him to continue.
"But it came with a cost, Atlas people come from an old line of elves, that lock away certain parts of the psyche under strict walls, the madness separated his four states of being and made them fight one another, but using the power of the void Zomearon was able to once again restore balance to his consciousness, at another cost of course, his sanity was gone, his empathy was null, and his self was just gone," explained Scandar like it was normal to understand all this.
"Zomearon evolved into a Time Keeper Lord via the words of the world,"
The Words of the World, that's you Sibyl, right?
>When Zomearon evolved, a message must have played over the intercom, thus allowing everyone to hear our voice.
>This confirms it, Zomearon indeed has another AI at this disposal, and we should prepare accordingly.
"What's a Time Keeper Lord?" I asked.
"Elves have 4 evolutions, all ranking exponentially in power, Customary Fey is level one, High Elf Fey, is level two, Royal Summer Elf Fey, is level three, and Celestial Enliven Fey of Seasons," explained Scandar.
"AKA Zomearon has the power to become a celestial god," said Dragan.
"One that roams the heaven's smiting with his mighty lance those he deems unworthy, of course, this form would be corrupted since he's using the power of the void to evolve," explained Scandar, taking a sip of tea.
Yes, it had alcohol in it.
"So what is Lore One?"
"Hold on - we're getting there," said Scandar once more.
"So Zomearon used his newfound power to destroy everyone in Atlas and bury the city beneath the waves of the sea," explained Scandar.
"They called this - his instrumentality." Said Scandar, full stop.
"Zomearon let life grow and hid himself from the lowly humans, observing them from afar, not interfering."
"For a time, life grew, and Zomearon watched from space, like looking at a marble, for a time life was nice, if you ignored the big halo in the sky of course, centuries passed and people forgot, only just seeing the sky as a novelty, it was always there, why would it stop being there,"
"That until Zomearon lost his Celestial form and de-evolved back into a human, one day this heavenly halo was just gone, people took it as a sign of cataclysm of course, but it wouldn't come until much much later," continued Scandar.
"Zomearon in his infinite maddening knowledge, wrote down his will, and through it accepted spirits, or souls, at first none came, until there were so many he could barely keep up with the mana influx to keep them all in one place,"
"Every Zomearon spirit, gets what is called a Sterling Theory, a power so pure it can destroy worlds,"
"Zomearon knew this, and accepted spirits anyway, he gained popularity among the meta, mostly earthlings like yourself,"
"It's because we don't have magic or anything,"
"That's your fault kiddo - you were cut off a long time ago, and the gods of the meta do not unblock, one strike and you out!"
I looked at Dragan, he smirked his lips and shrugged his shoulders.
"Nevertheless - Zomearon accepted men and women, of course, don't we know it by now, *hip*," his drunkness was getting to him.
"You all right Dad?" said Dragan in a worried voice.
"I'm fine - just a little drunk *hip*"
"Anyway," he continued. "The first Zomearon spirit initiates a sterling theory cataclysm, Cronus becomes inhospitable, humans build settlements, bla-bla-bla you know the deal, you read books in your world right?"
"Uhh…" I said. I wasn't that big of a reader, I read more comics than actual books, but I had no idea if he knew what a comic is.
"Or watch those people trapped in a box,"
What?!
"Anyway, that's Lore One for you, pretty good stuff right?" he suddenly started spreading his whole body onto the floor like he was melting, and within seconds he passed out.
Snoring peacefully into the night.
It took 52 of those teas to get him this way.
Dragan grabbed a summer blanket and placed it over his body.
"We should grab our room too," he said to me and picked me, I had been in my slime form this whole time.
Once in our room, we cuddled on the bed, Dragan pressing me against his body.
"What did you think about all that," he said looking at the ceiling.
"I don't know, it's a lot to process," I said.
"I know, I'm sorry he had to lay it out all like that to you," he said in a sweet deep voice.
"Don't worry about it, I'd rather have all the info than just parts of it,"
"Yeah sorry about that too,"
I snuggled with him even more.
"I like the way things are right now," I said.
Dragan paused for a moment.
"Hey - can I ask for a boon?"
"Sure anything," I said.
"Is it too much to ask for you to make the room cold, this spring heat is just overwhelming with this rain," he said. It was humid and hot, the worst combination.
"Oh that?" like the push of a button, cold wind blew through me and into the room, it wasn't snowing, but quickly the temperature inside dropped to a breezy chilly 20C, I kept it like that as long as I could.
"Yeah - that's the stuff," said Dragan. Since my skin couldn't detect cold or hot, weather wasn't much of an issue, so things like this needed to be communicated.
He whispered into sleep, with a slow and steady rise of his chest, his snores humble and soft.
I too turned my brain off, except I left a slow and steady stream of mana in the background from me to him.
It had become routine by now.
His skin would regain its glow and the scales would be visible, as I slipped mana into a background process. Sibyl was in charge while I slept, and would wake me up if something happened.
Nothing bad had happened so far, so I let it sit, like a phone charging in the background. It seemed like it helped Dragan sleep better as well.