Book 3 Chapter 26: The Ancient Works

++One cannot leave something unattended for several thousand years without finding a surprise or two.++

- From the writings of Isabel Vornholt, ‘The Great Lich’. 1,891 A.E.

My laboratory was an enormous structure. I knew from memory that its total volume was greater than that of most modern cities, and its layout was deliberately confusing. I was able to navigate the place easily enough of course, memory leading me true, but Sakhent seemed to be deliberately memorising every twist and turn as we went, formulating a map in his mind. It would do him no good. Unless he was willing to spend several months just on walking, he would simply not see the whole place.

Even as Lord Dread, this had an oddly disconcerting feeling. I was perpetually racked with the sensation of being watched, or perhaps ‘tracked’ would be the more accurate word. Like someone was working a scrying on me, though I knew for a fact that no such magic could target me without being noticed.

Once, this had been my domain. Once. But my absence had given time for change to come over all the great beasts and monsters I had chained away here. As we grew nearer to one of my specimen storage chambers, the first of several, I felt something close to nervousness growing in the back of my mind.

There were things entombed here that could kill me, with luck or numbers. Lord Dread was a mighty creature, but in my war against the Gods I had called on powers to shake the very world.

Some of them may have slipped their bonds.

Sakhent was clearly heeding my warning from before, too, because I could see that even while memorising the route, he was on guard for an attack. Indeed, he was probably memorising it because he was on-guard, no doubt planning for a scenario in which I perished and he was forced to flee on his own.

The thought crossed my mind that he was intending to let me die here deliberately, and become the world’s most powerful lich once more, but I dismissed it. He would not throw away so vital an ally at this stage of our plans.

We passed one of my old weapon’s development sections as we neared the first specimen chamber, and Sakhent’s eye, of course, wandered to one of the larger pieces there, a great, jutting spire of dark metal that I had once held many plans for.

“WHAT IS THAT?” he asked. “I HAVE NEVER SEEN ANYTHING LIKE IT.”

Memories flashed through me, old and humbling. I almost felt nostalgic.

“I CALLED IT THE STAR-SPEAR.”

Sakhent nodded in appreciation. “A GOOD NAME. BUT WAS IT WORTHY OF IT?”

The eternal question.

“...IT WAS DESIGNED TO ABSORB AND CHANNEL AMBIENT MANA, STORING IT BEFORE UNLEASHING IT IN A CONCENTRATED BEAM. ON A TEST FIRE, I ONCE USED IT TO VAPORIZE SOME SIZEABLE FRACTION OF A MOUNTAIN. IT WAS CREATED TO KILL A GOD.”

“AND COULD IT?”

“NO.”

I knew more now than I had back then. Knew that, by concentrating so much mana into so small a space, I would have been generating a great wall of plasma in front of my own beam, one that would re-absorb much of the energy and reduce my weapon’s efficiency. I knew that it would be more efficient to expend power banishing that plasma than it would be to simply put more heat into trying to overcome it.

And I knew that even if I managed to double or triple the power of the Star-Spear, it would not kill a God.

Sakhent seemed to sense my irritation at past failures, and held his tongue for once. It did not take us much longer to reach the first specimen chamber.

This was one of the largest parts of my laboratory, simply because of how many specimens I had acquired over the years. During my reign I had almost pathologically captured and stored the world’s magical creatures for study. Over thousands of years, my collection had become vast.

I had pilfered orcs and Iqithi, fae and goblins, gnomes and halflings and other things, rarer things. Intelligent whales that move through the air instead of water, living trees and the young, green-skinned women who emerged from them, ants that ate metal and rocks that bleed milk. A thousand varieties of beast, freak or entity all encased within my walls. And this was only one of several specimen vaults.

Finally, Sakhent’s quiet scorn for my laboratory fizzled out.

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“HOW LONG DID THIS TAKE?” he asked.

“A WHILE.”

I was only half-focused on the conversation, with much of my attention being eaten up by my studying the containment devices that dotted the chamber. They were all massive vaults of heavy metal, made from a dull-grey substance I had since heard modern Garamon call ‘tungsten’. It had simply been the hardest non-magical metal available to me at the time.

Sakhent aided me in looking through the subjects and ensuring that they were all still contained. In-between them was the machinery I had come here for, the various racks and instruments that I had once used to vivisect and experiment on my prisoners.

I would be doing the exact same thing with them now, of course, except now I had a better prisoner. Of particular note was the equipment needed to magically induce micro-scale conditions and regulate ambient mana within them.

“THIS EQUIPMENT IS FASCINATING,” Sakhent remarked as he helped me move it, depositing it into a pocket world of his own. “YOU SEEM TO HAVE STUMBLED ONTO THE PRINCIPLE OF BODILY PRESERVATION AND ENHANCEMENT PRACTICED IN ESTIA, THOUGH YOU PURSUED IT FROM MORE…MATERIAL DIRECTIONS.”

It was a fair assessment. Much of my reign had been spent attempting to squeeze more use from the hordes of undead I summoned. Even one million normal humans posed no threat to a Demigod. One million normal humans enhanced with preternatural speed and strength, though, could eventually kill one with sheer numbers.

Such was my theory at least.

“HOW DID YOUR PEOPLE ACHIEVE THIS?” I asked abruptly, seeing a chance to learn.

“AS I SAID, WE TENDED TO THE CONNECTION BETWEEN BODY AND SOUL AND ENSURED THAT IT REMAINED STRONG. SOULS ARE POWERFUL THINGS, AND WHEN SEPARATED FROM THE CORPUS THEIR POWER IS SET FREE. DIRECTED PROPERLY, THEY WILL STRENGTHEN THEIR OWN FORM WITHOUT ANY POWER EXPENDITURE ON THE NECROMANCER’S PART.”

It was a fascinating concept, for several reasons. The sheer utility of exploiting an external power source fascinated me, but the metaphysical implications were more significant still.

“SOULS ARE REAL, THEN? NOT JUST THE CONSCIOUSNESS PRODUCED BY AN OVER-DEVELOPED BRAIN?”

“YES. THOUGH THEY ARE NOT THE SEAT OF CONSCIOUSNESS. SOULS ARE THE VITAL ENERGY THAT ANIMATES AND SUSTAINS LIVING TISSUE. THEY ARE SHAPED BY THE BRAIN, AND CAN SHAPE IT IN TURN. BUNDLES OF MANA.”

“NOT MANA,” I corrected. “I CANNOT SEE THEM.”

“CAN YOU SEE ALL TYPES OF MANA?”

I paused. Technically, I could not possibly answer that question.

“THIS DEMANDS FURTHER INVESTIGATION,” I said at last.

Sakhent agreed as we continued clearing out the chamber. I did not let myself get too deeply involved in that before I had examined one of the specimen containers, one for a disembodied subject that would pose little physical threat if freed. I still braced myself as I interfaced with the unit and extended my consciousness to its interior.

This was one of the extraplanar subjects, a being from beyond my own world. Those were always…unpredictable.

But this one had never been hard to figure out. As I had expected, the moment I opened a mental connection, its mind smashed against mine like a locomotive.

“YOU DARE IGNORE ME? RELEASE ME THIS INSTANT, AND I WILL MAKE YOUR DEATH ONLY MODERATELY AGONIZING AND EQUAL TO OR LESS THAN THREE MILLION YEARS, YOU WILL PAY FOR IMPRISONING ME, I WILL KILL THE VERY CONCEPT OF YOUR EXISTENCE, YOU WILL LEARN THE HARD WAY WHY NONE DARE TO OPPOSE HOUSE SHAIAG—” I broke the link before more impotent threats could come my way.

Sakhent was staring at the device, having been privy to the mental link himself.

“WHAT WAS THAT?” he asked.

“SOME MAGICIAN I ENCOUNTERED A LONG TIME AGO,” I explained. “FROM AN ENTIRELY DIFFERENT UNIVERSE. POWERFUL AND SHOCKINGLY KNOWLEDGEABLE, THOUGH UNFORTUNATELY TOO MENTALLY STURDY FOR ME TO PLUNDER THEIR SECRETS.”

That was particularly irksome now. With my new project, the power to shape living flesh as I already did mana would have proven invaluable.

Still, I had at least confirmed that the containment units here were undamaged. If something as intelligent and resourceful as that prisoner remained, then I saw no reason the others would have been broken. The only ones I would have to concern myself with now were the great paragons of brute force and raw mana.

And those were stored in the next chamber on.

Studying the rest of this one, I noticed that most of my other subjects remained alive, having been chosen for their robust bodies and magic. I may come back later, should I need to experiment on them again.

We moved further into the laboratory, relieved to have not been attacked but not letting ourselves relax. Some of the things I held prisoner here were clever as well as powerful, fully capable of setting an ambush when they thought my guard was down.

It was in the next specimen vault that I finally saw the last pieces of equipment I needed.

“LET US HURRY,” I said. “I DO NOT WISH TO RISK STAYING HERE A SECOND LONGER THAN IS NECESSARY.”

For once, Sakhent did not have a quip ready to retaliate with. He must have felt my own concern, for he hurried alongside me to dismantle the equipment and begin storing it. We were nearly finished within a minute.

And then the complication arose.

I circled around the room vacuuming up the devices I needed when I came across a breached containment unit. Breached from the inside-out. I stared at it for a moment, stretching my memory to recall what had been inside it before I realised the full row behind it was emptied too.

“SAKHENT,” I shouted. “THERE HAS BEEN A CONTAINMENT BREACH!”

Were it not for my warning, the ambush would have been disastrous indeed.