Vin spent the next twenty-four hours wandering the library, reading a bit here and there as he went. He was hesitant to really get engrossed in anything after the last ti they’d stopped by, where he’d grabbed a few heavy tos on the basics of artifact creation and ended up spending two-straight days reading without even noticing how much ti had gone by. He figured Alka or the librarian would tell him once the repairs were done, but even so, he didn’t want to lose himself like that again.
During his wandering, he actually ended up stumbling upon Kym sitting at one of the tables, heavily engrossed in a book as always. The man had a small smile on his face as he read in utter silence, ignoring the quiet golems wandering around and tending to the books. Not wanting to disturb him, Vin decided against asking him how he was doing with his new life within the library.
In the end, Vin grabbed a few books on dream magic, deciding that was as good a place to research as any seeing as it was the newest affinity he’d added to his magical repertoire. Despite finishing the dream journey and connecting his mana-pool to his unconscious mind, which theoretically should allow him to continue practicing magic even as he slept, doing so was sothing he’d yet to attempt. He was tempted to get a jump start on reconstructing the runic formations for Dream Walk and Dream Mark as both spells were still patiently waiting for him in the back of his mind thanks to his Iron Mind passive, but it wasn’t too often they ventured all the way over to the library, and he didn’t want to waste the opportunity to conduct research. By the ti Alka ca to find him, Vin had finished three small books all about the many uses of dream magic, and he was ready for a break.
“Good to go?” he asked, spotting Alka as she climbed up the lander to join him on the third level.
“Yep! Back in tip-top shape!” she said, gesturing down to her mismatched body. “Well. Sort of. Any chance we can stop by the Crater really quick?”
While the librarian was able to restore the damaged portions of Alka’s golem form, she could do nothing about the darthsteel plating coating her body. Only Deorer, the dwarven Smith of Relics, was skilled enough to handle that, and Vin chuckled as he got to his feet and directed them out of the library.
With how much of a habit this was becoming, he couldn’t help but wonder how long it would be before Deorer started dumping enough Darthsteel over Alka that she wouldn’t be able to move.
Vin didn’t know if it was the heat-resistant flowers he and Shia had dropped off for the dwarves in exchange for armor for the Earthers, or just that the dwarves were starting to get used to him, but he was surprised to find the dwarves manning the dungeon checkpoint acting far friendlier toward him than they usually did. Their whole town had a fresh new layer of color to it, and Vin admired the wide-variety of colors growing everywhere as they headed toward the pool of lava in the center.
“You’re back again?!” a dwarf wearing black stone armor called out, scowling as Alka waved at him from the edge of the lava. “Are you daft, girl? I told you to stop damaging my work!”
“I just love seeing your smiling face!” Alka called back, laughing to herself as Deorer threw a hamr at her which bounced off her face with a loud clang. “The sooner you patch up, the sooner we get out of here! You and I both know I don’t need to eat, so I’ll just keep talking to you otherwise!”
That was all the encouragent the smith needed, and Vin watched curiously as Deorer all but dragged Alka into the lava his smithy was built within. The dwarf’s calloused hands moved so quickly, going from one half-subrged darthsteel container to the next, that Vin barely even kept up with what he was doing. It wasn’t long before he held a glowing-white crucible of sorts in his bare hands, shoving Alka down across his anvil and pouring the glowing tal along her damaged portions before smoothing it out. When he was done and she sat back up, she was coated once more and looked as good as new.
“The next ti I’m going to remove your foot and keep it to study!” Deorer warned, shaking a fist at them as they headed back to the dungeon. The entire process had taken less than an hour, with the majority of it being spent with Deorer carefully applying the tal to her body.
“I like him,” Alka said while they headed back to Terra. “He’s fun to ss with.”
“Maybe don’t taunt the hand that repairs you?” Vin suggested, shaking his head at Alka’s indifferent shrug.
Reaching the Underside fragnt parallel to Terra, Vin smiled as he spotted Lul sitting in her usual seat, engrossed in ditation. The Mage of Discovery looked as calm and serene as she always did when ditating, and Alka snorted as she punched him in the arm none too gently.
“I’ll leave you two lovemates alone. Chat with you later.”
With that, Alka headed through the corridor back to Terra, and Vin sat down across from Lul. As he looked at her, his eyes looked through her for a brief mont, and he saw the complex runic formation she was working on putting together within her soul. Whatever she was trying to pull off, it was packed with so many different runes Vin was pretty certain it had to be a tier-5 spell, and he blinked as he realized he’d inadvertently slipped into using Beyond the Veil again.
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Scowling at his own lack of control, Vin forced himself to look away, blinking a few tis to get his vision to return to normal. The Goddess of Benevolence had made it quite clear that he should use the class ability as little as possible until he reached level 50, but sotis the ability practically triggered itself seemingly out of nowhere. Thankfully, using it to look into a mage’s mana and see what spell they were working on was a pretty minor application of the ability, and Vin didn’t even have so much as a nosebleed from the slip up, much less feeling like he was going to fall into another coma. Even so, it was better to be safe than sorry. He was already level 48, and halfway to level 49 at this point. He could hold out until he hit level 50.
While he was debating whether to start working on Dream Walk or Dream Mark first, Lul stirred, a warm smile spreading across her face as she ca out of her ditating and realized he was sitting before her.
“Vin!” she said, leaning forward and giving him a warm kiss before sitting back and blushing slightly as she looked at him. “How long have you been watching do spell work?”
“Not long. Alka and I only just got back from the library,” he admitted, trying to ignore the mory of Alka teasing him about Lul hiding sothing. If Lul was trying to keep sothing a secret from him for whatever reason, he was sure she had a good reason for doing so. “What spell were you working on? It looked like a tier-5.”
“It did, did it?” Lul asked, her smile quickly turning into a frown as Vin winced at his slip up. After his last coma, he’d promised Lul and his friends he’d hold off on using Beyond the Veil as much as possible before hitting level 50.
“Co on, it’s my own class ability! It’s hard to control!”
“I know,” she sighed, taking his hand in her own. Her gel-like skin was soft and cool to the touch, and she ran her thumb along his knuckles as she spoke. “I appreciate you trying when you can. We just don’t want to find you lying comatose on the ground again, you know?”
“Trust , you’re not alone in that regard,” Vin snorted. “So what was the spell?”
“A really big one that would be a ga changer if I can pull it off,” Lul admitted, grinning excitedly as she always did whenever they talked magic. “It is a tier-5, so I have to be incredibly careful. I’ve been working on it for soti now, but it will probably be a while before it’s finished. It will be my first tier-5 spell, so I can’t wait!”
“Definitely take your ti in that case. The last thing we need is you teleporting yourself halfway into a wall,” Vin said, shuddering at the thought. The higher a spell’s tier, the worse the runic backlashes were when the mage ssed up the formation. If a tier-3 runic backlash could be enough to kill a person, he didn’t even want to know what a tier-5 backlash might look like. He knew Lul was incredibly talented and he had the utmost of faith in her, but still, runic backlashes could happen to anyone.
“I’ll be careful, don’t worry,” she said, growing more reserved as she smiled at him. “What about you? Any plans now that Alka’s fixed up?”
“Are you kidding? My to-do list is long enough I could wrap it around Terra’s outer wall,” Vin scoffed. “To start, I want to dive back into dream magic, seeing as I didn’t really get a chance to ss around with it after Fred and I finished up my dream journey. But Theodore just let know that the Necromancers are done with Landon, so I need to go grab him first.”
“Oh, that will be interesting to see how much he’s learned after all this ti,” Lul said, perking up at the thought. While she was primarily focused on spatial magic herself, Vin knew that her mother, the head of the court mages from her kingdom, had affinities for water and death magic. Because of that, Lul knew a lot more about death magic than the average mage.
“Want to co with? I figured Landon might need a little dinsional help when it ca to traveling back to Terra.”
“Sure! You know I’m always happy to join you for your adventures,” Lul said, getting to her feet and walking hand-in-hand with him as they made their way across the Underside.
“We’re just picking up a single guy, I don’t think this qualifies as much of an adventure,” Vin admitted. Once they reached the right corridor and Lul warped them past the dungeon monsters, Vin frowned as he peered up at the sky. It seed the librarian had taken closer to a day and a half to finish repairing Alka, as night was already falling. The fragnt with the floating library was darker than most, so it was tricky trying to tell what ti of day it was over there.
The two of them strolled across the adows of the Necromancers’ fragnt, enjoying the crisp, night air as they walked. With how frequently Vin found himself running from one ergency to the next, it was nice to take a few minutes to relax here and there. Lul seed to feel the sa, as she had her usual small smile that she always seed to have when it was just the two of them on their own.
“You still owe a dream date,” she reminded him after a while, giggling as she squeezed his hand. “You did promise one, in case you forgot.”
“I’m working on it,” Vin argued, laughing along with her. “As soon as I figure out Dream Walk, we’ll go wherever you want. I suppose I could still give you specific dreams with Create Dream now if you wanted, but I wouldn’t be a part of them.”
“I’ll wait until you can join then,” she said, her smile faltering as they crested a small hill and the Necromancers’ compound ca into sight. “…What’s that?”
Vin paused as he tried to figure out what he was looking at. Groth and a few other people he didn’t recognize were all shouting, hanging back and directing a few squads of undead forces to battle in their stead. Because standing between all of them, reaching nearly ten-feet-tall and roaring an otherworldly cry, was an undead abomination unlike anything Vin had ever seen.
With Landon riding along its back.
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