Sacrifice Mage

I wasn’t going to lie. Gushal Uralivanth’s revelation about House Brasvay rooted me to the spot in surprise.

“House Brasvay is moving out of Zairgon,” Gushal said.

Of all the things I had expected, that wasn’t it. “What? Then why in the world are they obsessed with my temple?”

“You misunderstand. The temple is clearly an object of some ulterior goal. Financially speaking, many of their investments have moved to Claderov. In fact, as per my latest inquiry, they have reinvested all of the return on prior, local investments from the last three months into various Claderov institutions.”

“I’ve corroborated that, Ross,” Revayne said. “See the trains? A good chunk of the funding is coming from House Brasvay. And your food is getting cold. Does Sacrifice lose value if your meals go stale or rotten?”

“I… can’t believe I never tested that out,” I said. “Anyway. So Brasvay are moving their finances to Claderov…?”

Gushal nodded. “They’re moving their main power to Claderov, yes.”

That was concerning, mostly because I wasn’t sure how to decipher everything I had learned so far. Brasvay moving their crap to Claderov, yet Claderov being the one to happily fund the capital I needed to take down Uralivanth—not that I had stated my intention to them—all while Brasvay was using Uralivanth to get to me.

Somehow, I didn’t feel like they were disconnected events. Even now, even after I believed that the actions I had taken had been proactive, I felt like there was a bigger plan I couldn’t grasp.

And that made me scowl hard.

“Alright, deal,” I said. “I’ll back off from Uralivanth but one condition.”

“Which is?” Gushal asked.

“That you, Gushal Uralivanth, take control of your House and make sure you never look in Ring Four’s direction again.”

Gushal swallowed. “It will take a little bit of time, but I can agree to that.”

“Good, because I’ve got no quarrel with you, Gushal. Just the members of your family who insist on being assholes.” I paused for a moment. “I’m not going to apologize for how far the violence went. But at the same time, I’m willing to—I have to—take responsibility for what happened to Kaham Uralivanth.”

I didn’t need to admit anything. Not here. Not anywhere. Yet the sincerity of our little deal meant I needed to keep everything out in the open. I wouldn’t claim that I had been forced to kill Kaham, but at the same time, calling it a cold-blooded murder wasn’t entirely accurate.

“He was going to get himself killed anyway,” Gushal said. He didn’t sound callous or vicious, just sad in a bitter way. “We were close when we were young, but he drifted apart as he grew older and decided to be involved in the wrong side of the family. My entreaties fell on deaf ears.”

I sighed. “The deal stands, then?”

“The deal stands. Some sacrifices must be made. You would know that well, Cultist.”

I wasn’t sure I wanted to agree but decided against disputing the point.

“I will pretend I heard nothing,” Revayne said, face buried in her book once more.

Gushal and I exchanged quick grins. I did note the fondness with which he glanced at his wife, which more than anything made me feel secure in this deal we had just drawn up.

Unfortunately, neither of them had suggestions on how to actually go after Brasvay the way I had done for Uralivanth. Unlike the latter, they were significantly savvier at keeping themselves safeguarded against things like what I had done to Uralivanth.

For now, the best thing I could do was just remain wary.

While the deal with Gushal suggested that House Uralivanth was no longer going to be a significant problem, I didn’t let myself relax. Gushal didn’t yet represent the entirety of his House. My actions had greatly stumped and stymied House Uralivanth, so they weren’t going to forget about me anytime soon.

That said, I could relax a bit, focusing once again on training up my Attributes and Aspects.

Over the next few days, I worked on seeing if I could manifest another Compound Aspect. So far, I had come up with Starburst and Protostar, combining Gravity, Flare, Illumination, and Entropy in various measures. Well, the former didn’t have Entropy at all.

But there were two prongs I wanted to advance. One was seeing if I could acquire a different Compound Aspect based on controlling how and how much I applied the constituent Aspects. The other prong was trying to combine my Ritual and Sacrifice Aspects into the mix as well.

The first was hard. Even after a couple of days of work, I wasn’t getting anywhere. Maybe it was because I didn’t have a strong goal in mind.

I thought about different forms my combination of Aspects could take, and how I could then spread them around. Could I maybe create tiny bullets of gleaming light, infusing them with vaporizing heat while also using Photonic Compression to make the “bullets” themselves hold tremendous amounts of destructive capabilities?

Well, if I could, I wasn’t exactly making progress towards it. I found a workaround to achieve it, of course. With Capacity, I could shape the Concentrations of heat into those bullets, then use Illumination to turn it devastatingly bright.

Throwing it without the new Power Augmentation I was training up with Gutran was annoying. Field Manipulation sufficed, but still. I was looking for progress here, not repeating what I was already capable of.

Needless to say, I didn’t acquire the Compound Aspect I was going for. I also sadly didn’t find a way I could properly tie Sacrifice to it. Or Ritual. One thing I explored was trying to remotely activate one of those Aspects, which was eminently possible with Ritual’s Circle. Not with Sacrifice, though. I’d have to pay attention and explicitly activate the Aspect to use it.

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What I did find was that my Icon was taking on new properties and appearances. There were the swirls on the surface I had noted earlier, of course. Now, after my latest round of experiments, I found several sparks running all along the surface.

I was, of course, Sacrificing my Icon manifestations to boost up the process. That was one trick I hadn’t yet mentioned to Hamsik about my seemingly rapid Icon manifestation rate.

No problem. What he didn’t know wasn’t going to hurt him.

A part of me was still considering what to get for my remaining Entropy Affix. After some thinking, I had decided I was going to try and manifest it as a shield of sorts. Yet another way to stop my enemies’ attacks from reaching me.

I had a myriad ways of manifesting mana around me. Mana Injection, Manifestation, and so on were all pretty effective. I just needed an Affix from Entropy that could automatically turn those external mana threads into something like a simulacra for Framework. It would just be a smaller-scale armour around myself that would instantly decay any foreign Aspects that touched it.

Of course, it was all well and good in my head. Actually making such an Affix appear wasn’t going to come in so easily. Especially when I figured out a sister Affix, so to speak.

Which I then realized was already covered by Multicast.

Essentially, I began wondering about whether any of my Aspected attacks could have some sort of entropic effect attached to them. Yes. Yes, of course they could. With Multicast, I was tying heat and weight to the light I called forth using Illumination. I could also have the light start to decay anything and everything caught within its grasp with Atomized Oblivion.

Brilliant. Also… kind of evil. Which was a matter of perspective, anyway. It was certainly cool, though. The idea of light that could eat away at whatever it shone made me shiver a little.

Gushal Uralivanth didn’t feel like he was married. His thoughts churned as he headed towards the study.

Shouldn’t a married man be floating in the clouds of bliss? Should he not be spending time with his beloved? Should he not be happy?

Unfortunately, Gushal was none of those at the moment. Sure, he couldn’t deny that the first few weeks after his wedding had been enjoyable. He was able to ignore his responsibilities while slowly coaxing his beautiful wife into the same, temporarily hedonistic path he was treading. She had been responsive too.

And now, it had all come crashing down because his House had finally bitten off more than they could chew.

A part of him wanted to blame Ross Moreland for the debacle. His family had been involved in all the illicitness they had been accused of for ages. Decades turning into centuries. It was only now that they had messed with Ross that they had gotten stung.

But Gushal could never blame the Ring Four Cultist for responding in kind. Not after he had learned what his family had done.

They had attacked an academy student.

A child.

To orchestrate a crime of that nature was reprehensible. Gushal had always known a large side of his family was involved in several unsavoury lines of business. But to think they’d stoop to attacking a mere girl...

Gushal didn’t recognize this Uralivanth.

He knew the culprit, though, and it wasn’t his extended family. Sure, he was perhaps biased in their favour, but these were people he had grown up with, brothers and sisters and cousins whose lives he had shared. They had been corrupted.

It was hard to believe that Brasvay had provided a sufficient enough lure for them to act this way. That they’d been able to essentially bribe another Great House into stooping as low as them.

So hard to believe, in fact, that Gushal wasn’t surprised when he found what awaited him in his Great Uncle’s study.

“Ah, is this him?” the Vaunted asked.

It was impossible to not recognize the woman from Claderov. Tall, beautiful, golden hair shimmering like a curtain of sunlight, with an aura that made him feel particularly small.

“I needed him here,” said Gushal’s Great Uncle. “For this is the moment of transition.”

That stumped Gushal. “What is going on, Uncle?” He looked between the aged head of House Uralivanth and this noble figure from Claderov. “I thought we were about to find a compromise to my proposal.”

Really, there shouldn’t have been any need for any sort of compromise. What he was asking for was eminently reasonable.

“You wish to know what’s going on?” the Vaunted said, still with that damnable smile. “Well, let’s just say your wishes are about to be fulfilled.”

Gushal was still stumped. “What? And how do you know about my wishes, Vaunted?”

He was being more casual than was ideal, but the woman had been visiting Uralivanth manor a few too many times over the last month or so. In fact, she had been a presence ever since their troubles with Ross Moreland had begun. It was one of the chief reasons that had spurred him to warn Moreland about the link between Brasvay and Claderov.

“Allow me to make things clearer,” Vaunted Auriam said.

Her fellow noble stepped up. Gushal frowned. Wasn’t he the fellow who had gotten into a spar with Moreland? Gushal hadn’t even noted the man yet, his attention captured too strongly by the Vaunted.

“What is—”

Gushal was interrupted by his Great Uncle.

“Remain silent and watch, Gushal,” he said. “You are here as witness and nothing more. You wished for a new direction for House Uralivanth? This is the moment where that begins. This is the moment where you reign supreme.”

“Is it time?” the man asked, taking a knee before the Vaunted. Contrary to his boisterous reputation, he was now shivering a little.

“’Tis indeed time,” said the Vaunted. “I will uphold my side of the bargain, Lord Yulien.”

Gushal swallowed. What in the world was that man doing here? What was Gushal standing witness to?

“Alright, then,” Lord Yulien said. “If you indeed swear to safeguard my family, swear to ensure my debts will not fall back on them, swear that they can remain in what little prosperity I have managed to eke out for them, then I submit and surrender.”

“So, I swear,” the Vaunted intoned. Her tone was more formal than Gushal had ever heard it before. “Take solace in the fact that you’ve performed decently in Zairgon. The battle against the cultist, the funds you apportioned and acquired, the team you’ve led for the rail… you’ve almost redeemed yourself.”

“I did my best,” Lord Yulien said quietly.

“Yes. Rest assured that your efforts will be justly rewarded. So now, you can rest easy in the Beyond.”

Gushal’s whole body went tense. “What?” No… they couldn’t be planning what he thought they were, could they?

“Gushal,” his Great Uncle warned again. “Do not interfere. This is for the betterment of the House.”

“I do not trust your idea of betterment, Great Uncle. Your ideas are what led us here—”

Without warning, the leader of House Uralivanth stabbed Lord Yulien’s heart.

“No!” Gushal started forward but was frozen in place by a glare from the Vaunted.

“Enjoy your wish, little Uralivanth,” she said.

Lord Yulien looked down at the knife sticking out of his chest, coughing out blood as he slowly fell to the floor. In moments, he was still, a pool of crimson slowly widening around his corpse.

“What have you done?” Gushal couldn’t even react with the slowly dawning horror filling his soul. This killing, this murder… He was shaking his head in denial. “You’ve ruined us, Great Uncle. Ruined us!”

“I warned you he didn’t seem the type to understand,” the Vaunted said with haughty regret.

“Understand?” Gushal stepped up, stepped through the oppressive aura, no matter how much it made him feel like he was pushing against a mountain. “The only thing I need to understand is that you’re framing our House for your ends. That you’re about to claim House Uralivanth has murdered a noble from Claderov and destroy us. Why? Why would you do such a thing?”

“Because it is needed!” Great Uncle yelled. He physically grabbed Gushal’s shoulders, shaking him. “Because a change in leadership can only come if the ones in charge fall hard.”

That was such an insane reasoning, such a drastic overreaction to everything Gushal wanted, to everything he and his House was going through, that he was at a loss for words.

“Lord Gushal Uralivanth,” the Vaunted said. “Welcome to your reign over House Uralivanth. May you and your House prosper… once you navigate through the disaster of this war between Zairgon and Claderov that your family has just started.”

Gushal opened his mouth to reply but only got hammered in the head to utter darkness for his troubles.