Chapter 473: You Are Smiling (Bonus - GT)

The change in the stranger’s face was not large, and if I had not been watching before I asked that question, I would have missed it.

But I did not miss it.

"That is a very interesting question," the stranger said. "You know about the others."

I kept my voice flat. "It’s not a hard one. A god is dead, and I am sure that would draw attention, especially when he died trying to get hold of this."

I brought out the Death Stone, and the face of the stranger turned to it, and the entire murder of crows froze, even the ones in the air. Their wings no longer beat, but they did not fall. After all, there was no need to keep up the pretence that anything about these crows was in any way natural.

"So beautiful," the stranger whispered. "Even seeing it with my eyes, I can barely imagine the vision that went into its creation."

I tried not to let my disgust show, but something must have slipped out, as the stranger turned to me and grinned. "There is a race for the Death Stone, and I would very much like to be done before the others arrive. It would be a hassle to fight through their greed. So how about we make this as quick and painless as possible for you and me?"

My eyes fell on the heads of my companions again. I should not do this, but sometimes pain does not let a man choose the decisions he makes.

The tension in my body vanished, as I had finalised what I needed to do, and what was left were the actions I needed to take.

I closed my hand around the stone and put it away.

"Can I tell you something?" I said.

"Please."

"I have been sitting on this spot for three days."

"I am aware. It is a brave thing, not to run from the storm, and that is the reason I spent so long talking to you, and gave you that offer. Please choose it."

"Ah, but you killed my companions." I put the last piece of wood into the fire. "From that point forward, there was only one way this would end."

∞

I had sat here waiting for death, but I did not just sit here for nothing. Sure, the compass was grinding against the walls of my soul, and while that hurt, it was not debilitating, and I could push myself through the pain and do other things... and that was what I had been doing all this while.

I knew that I would be hunted, and I had hoped the warband would be far from my position before the hunters arrived, but knowing them, they would not have gone far. Most likely they were slowing down as much as possible to wait for me... they were brave and loyal, and I did not deserve them.

I remembered the moment they had arrived in the mountains of Dorrik, and the words Ruggah had said as they knelt and awaited the judgement of the god.

"We ask nothing for ourselves. We ask only that you receive us. We will kneel here until you do, for only in this place is there hope for our salvation."

Their deaths were one more mark in my memory reminding me of my weakness and my failure.

I was a mage, and we believe in preparation, and while I sat here for three days, my feet never left the earth, and this was important, because I had Stone Stance.

Stone Stance is a Celestial power that I did not fully understand, and it functioned outside the seal the System placed on my soul. I had avoided using it in this era since the day I landed, because I did not want any unknown complications to arise and destabilise whatever plans I was making.

But the time of being careful was over. The seal over my soul was forcing me to adapt to this era or leave, so there was nothing holding me back from making one final massive splash... to honour the memory of the nine who walked out of Serrath. If their souls were watching, let them see how I send them off.

Stone Stance makes the earth an extension of the body, and while I did not know how to grow this power specifically, it was still developing as I grew stronger, especially from the time I gained Earth Resonance.

I had access to Stone Stance and also to lightning, and so for three days I had been sitting here without making any outward motion, and under me, going out through the bedrock in every direction, thread by thread by patient thread, I had been writing Scripts in their thousands, at depths between forty feet and four hundred, laid out in an arc that started at the ridge behind me and ran north and east and west until it closed on itself twelve miles away.

Every scrap of Anima I could drag out of my soul was spent in creating Anchors, Risers and Fold-lines. Every one of them unpowered and unlinked, so they did not generate any wave of power. In this way, if not for my Stone Stance keeping me connected to the earth, even I would have thought I was writing meaningless scribbles inside the ground.

What I was attempting was incredibly ambitious, but I was following the memories of something I had observed, so it was not as if I had no plan for this project. I also knew that I had only one chance.

I was being monitored by the crows, so I could not show any obvious sign of what I was doing, and my greatest tool for Inscription was not even being used, but battle was always about deception.

When this stranger was talking, I wanted nothing more than to throw a bolt of lightning into his face, but I held back. The project was mostly done, and there would be no chance to go over it again and again. I would just have to trust my skills.

∞

"You are smiling," the stranger said.

"Am I?" I said. "I guess it is because I am relieved."

The stranger cocked his head to the side. "Oh. You have made your decision."

"Yes."

He waited for a while and finally said, "And what is your answer?"

"Do you know what the worst part of your job is?" I asked him.

He paused, and then sighed. "Why don’t you enlighten me."

"You have to walk to people." I rolled my shoulders. "Nobody calls a thing that feeds off death and despair, so you have to go to them. You came to my fire and you sat with me for a while. For my poor companions, that was a mistake... as for me..."

The grin on my face widened, and I let him see the bloodlust in my eyes, the sheer impossible weight of a man who had killed millions.

"...you should have been running."

The stranger turned his empty eyes towards me, and I felt him reaching with his perception, and he found nothing. Then he looked at the fire, frowned, and looked below it.

"What have you done to the earth?" he growled.

"Oh, we were just speaking," I smiled. "You would not understand. It is a mage thing."

Then I closed my hand.