Leveling up the World

Chapter 979: The Price For Learning

Fear always clouded one’s judgment, making them see things that didn’t exist. Alien was convinced in his words beyond a doubt. In this fake personal realm, the degree of that fear was made visible. Could it be valid? The mage had put in a lot of effort to protect himself from the entire world and everyone in it. It seemed absurd, but as the saying went, just because someone was paranoid didn’t mean someone wasn’t out to get him.

“It’s been like that for centuries,” Alien continued. “You just have to be awakened to notice. They’re everywhere, watching and killing anyone who attracts too much attention.”

With the current amount of emotions emanating from the mage, Dallion knew that it was hopeless to try and convince him with logic. The man had come to his conclusions and nothing could shake those convictions, at least as long as he was in his current state.

“Why didn’t you go back?” Dallion asked. “With spellcraft and enough electricity, it should be easy.”

The mage scowled at him.

“You think I didn’t try? Why do you think Katka is here? There’s no way out of this world without the Moons and they aren’t in the mood for gifts. It took me a lot to make a portal, and the only place I could get to was here.”

Dallion’s heart sank. After witnessing the realm and Alien’s abilities, he held on to the hope that going back could be a lot easier than it seemed. Now, it turned out that wasn’t the case.

“Teach me spellcasting and maybe we can pull it off.”

“Just like that?” Alien smirked. “There are five mages as far as I know. One of them is crap, two are in hiding, and the third doesn’t want to have anything to do with me.” By the sound of things, he didn’t put stock in Katka’s abilities. “I’ve spent years trying to boost the portal with Katka and I can’t even get into a minor world. Why should you be any different?”

The blobs of fear within Alien broke down, replaced by clusters of doubt and grains of awe

“You?” he asked, his expression shifting between mockery and hope. “No shit.”

“No shit.” Dallion nodded. “So, willing to try again with three people this time?”

There was a lot of bad blood between them. Back in the other world, there were times in which Dallion seriously considered going against his interest knowing that Alien would end up worse off. The feeling was clearly mutual. If the “zombies” in the city were just acting on instructions to attack any awakened within the city, Alien’s shotgun greeting showed he’d prefer Dallion dead than alive. Yet, as fate would have it, the mage’s desire to return to the awakened world was almost as great as Dallion’s himself. After all, there were no eternal enemies, just eternal interests.

Training started from the basics. It was pathetic for someone with a magic trait of over a hundred to focus on extracting magic threads again, and fail at it. But Dallion gritted his teeth and tried to follow Alien’s instructions as best he could. To his surprise, the mage turned out to be a rather good teacher. Many of his mannerisms and comments had a bit of Adzorg in them, though without the humor and encouragement.

Time moved on, as the single moment within the personal realm stretched to infinity. For days Dallion tried to pick up a lightning thread. Unlike magic, they snapped easily and burned to touch. Several times, Dallion tried getting a large enough shock in the hopes it would spontaneously trigger his spellcasting ability, but with no result.

The more Dallion tried, the more Alien’s emotions changed. At first, there was glee accompanied with vindication. After a while, it started to wear off. It seemed that observing others’ misery wasn’t a permanent means to improve the mage’s own mood. Had it been like that in the awakened world? So many decades, and all that time, he’d survived on negative emotions.

“Just stop,” Alien said on the fourth day. “You’re not getting it.”

“I see the threads,” Dallion countered. Even in a realm, he felt different from in the awakened world. For one thing, he needed to sleep at least five hours per night. “I just need to get the hang of it.”

“If you can’t get that by now, how will you do the complicated stuff?”

Instead of an answer, Dallion reached for a thread, making it snap in his attempt to pull it out. He felt so close, and yet so far away. Anger bubbled within him. There was a time when he would have exploded. Experience had taught him how to relax quickly, even if it didn't feel pleasant.

“Why did you betray Adzorg?” he changed the subject.

“Huh?”

“In the other world,” Dallion clarified. “You’d have been better off with him.”

“If you’re talking shit, let’s just end this and—”

“Was there a reason?” Dallion used his music skills. This time, the subtleness with which he did so, made them attach to the mage.

Alien paused, looking at the lake for several seconds. The calm surface was rippling as it had been for the last few days—seemingly real, but also like a recording playing on loop.

“Jeremy discovered me,” he said. “Less than a month after his awakening. I wasn’t a big shot. My parents weren’t even awakened. When I first emerged from my level one room, I knew nothing. I was confused as hell, and my local memories told me nothing. Then, he appeared—the greatest being I had seen—and took me under his wing.”

“You never were Adzorg’s disciple…” Dallion could see it now. Alien never had a chance. In such a state of confusion a person would be impressed by a single-level awakened. There was no way he’d feel differently upon seeing Jeremy in all his glory. “Was it the real him or the echo?”

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“He was real.” Alien sat down on the grass. “He told me everything about awakened, mages, and enough of the world that I could make sense of things. Then he put a Moonstone in my realm.” A blob of pain emerged in the mage’s head. “When I didn’t die, he told me I was special and told me he’ll find me a teacher to make me great.”

“We all saw how that turned out.”

“I was never meant to face the emperor. You think you had a raw deal, but you were lucky. You didn’t have your future sealed off. I did. Because of what I was, the only way I could progress was through magic. All my levels I gained from shrines and artifacts. The trials were humiliating. I wasn’t even close to completing a single one. Also, it wasn’t like the old man cared.”

“He did.” Dallion forced the truth a bit thanks to his music skills. “I saw a fragment of his memories.”

“He, too, was playing the role Jeremy created for him. When you’re taught by a puppet, the best thing you could do is move closer to the puppeteer.”

You really must have had two messed up lives, Dallion thought. His personal observation was that only people with issues were sent to the other world. It didn’t help that Jeremy had started using him as his personal Moonstone piggy bank since childhood.

“Have you been in touch with him? Jeremy I mean?”

Alien gave Dallion a look, as if he had spilled yogurt all over his clothes.

“What if you zap me?” Dallion asked.

“Say what?”

“Hit me with a lightning bolt.”

“Not that it won’t make me happy, but this isn’t the awakened world. You won’t get your powers sealed. If you die in here, you’ll get a heart attack out there, or at least some serious brain damage.”

An air of unease surrounded Dallion.

“Talking from experience?”

“I told you there are people after me. They didn’t just stop because I asked.”

That wasn’t good. Normally, Dallion would use his guard skills to leave the realm right away. Sadly, there was no telling if he’d have another opportunity such as this. As long as Alien wanted to escape this world, he’d be more inclined to be careful than any other mage in the world.

“Just don’t kill me.”

“You’re really serious?” The mage stood back up.

“The standard method isn’t getting anywhere, so—”

Before Dallion could finish his sentence, Alien cast a lightning bolt and pierced Dallion’s shoulder.

MAJOR WOUND

Your health has been reduced by 75%

You bastard, Dallion thought as the red rectangle emerged before his eyes. Alien was a lot faster in his personal realm than in the real world.

“You better hope that…” Dallion’s vision blurred. The strength of the attack combined with the built-up fatigue made it difficult to remain conscious. Reaching out in front of him, he tried to grab onto something, anything, only to have the red rectangle shatter to dust.

When Dallion opened his eyes next, Alien was gone. However, Euryale was there.

“You did something stupid again, didn’t you?” she asked, the snakes on her head moving gently in the breeze.

Dallion’s immediate reaction was to look around and check whether he hadn’t been transported to the awakened world. Alas, it was the same fake realm Alien had brought him into thanks to his power generator.

“Was it worth it?” The gorgon turned towards him.

Anything that will get me to you is worth it. “I got to see you.” Dallion smiled.

“There’s that.” The note of sadness in her voice was visible. “Is this where you live?”

The house in Alien’s realm was a mix between a modern wooden house and an expensive lake retreat. It was okay, though not what Dallion would consider his dream house. Then again, Alien was probably a lot younger when he had first created it. In the awakened world plumbing and electricity was considered a luxury, or a curse based on who one asked.

“No. It belongs to someone else.” Part of Dallion wanted to risk running up to the gorgon and embracing her. The only reason he didn’t was the fear that might end the dream and he wanted to talk to her a bit before it did. “I met Alien and Katka.”

Several dozen of Eury’s snakes straightened.

“It’s okay,” Dallion quickly added. “Everything’s fine. They…” he paused. “Mages aren’t such a big deal here.”

The gorgon relaxed a bit.

“They’re teaching me magic… again. If everything goes well, I might be back within a few days.”

“A few days…” the gorgon repeated. “I went to visit Gloria last week. Dallion’s six years old now.”

“Six years?”

That was a lot. Time dilation between the worlds was increasing. From Dallion’s perspective, only a few months had passed, but in the other world…

“They were polite to let me attend the birthday, but confused,” Eury went on. “All except little Dallion.”

Little Dallion. That was the child that could have been Dallion’s own son, if things with Gloria had turned out differently.

“I gave him a gift from the Architect. He enjoyed it, but I don’t think even he believed me.”

“How are Gloria and Falkner?”

“They’re well. The world doesn’t have overseers anymore, so they’re ordinary nobles, just as Veil used to be.”

“Used to be?”

“He’s a hunter now. It suits him a lot better. I even offered to train him, but he preferred to do it on his own.”

“Yeah. That sounds like Veil.”

“What about you?”

“I’m doing everything I can to get—”

“How are you?”

The question caught Dallion by surprise. The whole time he was so focused on tracking down leads that would get him to the awakened world that he hadn’t bothered to give his state much thought. It all just seemed so temporary—a set of hoops he had to jump through until returning to Euryale. In many ways, he was living like Jiroh had.

“There are still things I need to get used to,” he said. “Few of the awakened remember about that world, and all that do seem to be in hiding. Alien’s convinced that people are after him. I doubt it’s true.”

All of a sudden, the gorgon’s expression changed.

“It’s fine.” Dallion laughed. “He’s just being him. There’s nothing to worry about. Don’t worry.”

“You have something on your hand.” Euryale pointed.

Dallion looked down. There was a thin, green, growth on his left thumb. Like a string, it waved in the wind, continuing into the distance. Strange that he had never noticed it before. The strange thing was that it wasn’t a magic thread, at least not entirely. It resembled a music thread.

When Dallion reached out and plucked it out of his thumb, everything around him vanished.