The Ethersmith

Aolinn’s stance wasn’t all too imposing. She was a small girl, and her pout-like frown was irritating to look at more than threatening. She looked like she expected to be followed regardless, standing there with her arms crossed and feet wide, while every table around them watched and listened in.

“Nothing to say for yourselves?” Aolinn asked. “Then please leave. None of you are fit for a royal ballroom. Especially not you.” She walked directly beside Vivi’s seat, crossing her arms and looking down at her, while Vivi held her hand on her half-drunk wine glass.

Aolinn took the glass from her hands, which Vivi let happen, and the noblewoman continued her stare, saying, “I would like an apology for how you treated me earlier.”

“Hey,” Cael said, directing his own frown at Aolinn. “I don’t think you quite realize who you’re talking to.”

“I am talking to a bunch of unprincipled simpletons,” Aolinn said. “I respect your work as hunters, but that does not allow you to act however you wish, or raise your voice at a royal event. I’m going to kindly ask you to leave one more time.”

Vivi sighed and pulled out the letter from her pocket, showing it to Aolinn. “I was invited here personally by your father. Or will I get kicked out before he even shows up, before he can spark the deal he intended to? Is that the type of party you royals hold?”

Aolinn furrowed her brows dubiously, but accepted the letter. She stared at it for a short while, until she handed it back to Vivi, saying nothing.

“Well, you two were not invited by my father,” she said, turning to Cael and Alda. “Please leave.”

“But what if they’re my good friends?” Vivi asked. “Will you still kick them out disrespectfully, in front of me, even though you don’t know what kind of deal your father is trying to make with me?”

Vivi expected a louder argument to ensue, but to her surprise, Aolinn spoke quieter, while pinching the hem of her dress. “Disrespectfully? The only one who has been disrespectful is you. I’m only trying to tell you to follow our customs.”

“Everyone else seems to be just fine with us here, though,” Vivi said. “Your city would be rubble if I hadn’t cleared your storm. That should allow me leniency with your dress code, should it not?”

Now Aolinn’s frown was definitely a pout, her confident front turning to hesitation. She looked much younger by the second, perhaps even younger than Vivi. Aolinn’s behavior was surprisingly similar to what Vivi remembered back home, when she argued with Fellwater’s girls.

And now she’ll lash out with insults, realizing she can’t win with logic.

“Hmph,” Aolinn said. “You also stole our ether from the storm. But I suppose you are right. My father seems to favor you. I might have to take back my word. Feel free to stay. But please don’t cause a scene.”

Vivi raised an eyebrow, surprised. Did Aolinn actually have some sense in her head?

“Speaking of my father,” Aolinn said quietly, “looks like he’s here.”

Everyone’s attention, Vivi noticed, had shifted toward the now-open double doors at the back of the ballroom.

Helegar, the sub-sovereign himself, had finally arrived, wearing a suit of shiny bright purple locium, so extravagant it made him look stupid more than anything. Vivi remembered a hateful scowl on his face, out in the storm zone, but he now smiled wide, as if he was the most grateful person in the whole world.

Well, Veronica did say he was charismatic…

Of course, he was the most popular person at the party. “Thank you, thank you,” he was saying as he shook hands with his most important guests—mostly nobles that Vivi didn’t recognize.

The mood elsewhere turned more awkward, as conversations quieted down, now more hesitant. Everyone looked ready to lower their heads in case Helegar looked in their direction.

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I would have liked to keep talking with the Darkwinds, though… Vivi thought with a sigh.

She was wondering if she should also get up and go greet Helegar and ask him about what his offer was to just get this whole party over with, when an ethereal presence appeared next to her.

“Vivian,” a voice said close to her ear, making her flinch.

It was Lortel, having appeared in her usual style, out of nowhere, wearing her the same skirt she’d worn to the Lifeweavers’ mansion. Aolinn let out a yelp, stumbling a step backward, and chairs shrieked as Cael and Alda jumped from their seats.

“I found the assassin,” Lortel said, her voice urgent. “Everyone here is in danger. We must leave now.”

“Huh?” Vivi asked.

“Are these your friends?” Lortel asked, seeing Alda and Cael, who looked like they were ready to call their spirits and kill Lortel immediately.

“She’s an ally!” Vivi said. “She just looked off, it’s—”

Her words trailed off when she spotted one of the guardsmen in the corner of the room pulling the string of a bow, aimed directly at Helegar’s head.

Lortel gritted her teeth. The arrow released, and Lortel’s figure disappeared. In a flash, she was between the glowing spirit arrow and the sovereign, knocking the arrow off of its trajectory. It crashed against the ground, cracking the ground loudly, as if enhanced by crush runes.

The sound froze everyone into place, shocked. Everyone silently stared at the arrow.

Then explosions came from the walls.

The pretty wallpapers crumbled as holes appeared in the walls, bricks crushed to bits. Four holes appeared, two the left and two right right. Figures rushed in from the holes and the double doors, all with strong ethereal presences.

Screaming followed, and the ballroom erupted into chaos.

Ether hunters called their spirits, while nobles scrambled into corners, wherever they could hide behind hunters. Aolinn screamed, clinging to Vivi, who called out her aura of five thousand ether.

The overwhelming rush of invaders filled the ballroom. Swords clashed and furniture crumbled as the invaders—demons, dozens of them—rushed in. They wore dark cloaks embellished by red moonweaver’s silk. Everyone’s auras blew outward, turning the ballroom into a mess of ethereal sensations.

Their scorched faces and horns were open for all to see, no masks covering identities. Each demon fought with an outside-carved black asmite runesword, the red misty auras of which quickly filled the room like smoke from a fire, clouding vision.

Vivi could hardly think of her next move when a demon attacked her, a runesword clashing down at her. She summoned Dawnpour, Grandpa’s seven-runed sword, and slashed at his sword. The asmite runesword snapped like a twig as Vivi’s inside-carved sword far overpowered it, cutting the demon behind it. He collapsed.

By then, the first ether hunters were cut dead, blood spraying to the nobles they were supposed to protect.

Lortel grabbed Helegar’s hand, pulling him to Vivi while slashing another arrow. Vivi couldn’t tell what her weapon Lortel used—it looked like just her hand, hardened with ether.

By the time Lortel reached Vivi, she had activated Ascension Of Divinity, bringing her ether count to ten thousand. She killed the next closest invader, cutting him in half amongst the screams of nobility.

Where next? Vivi thought. Who do I save?

Veronica Lifeweaver was dead.

A runesword pierced her heart from behind. Her killer kicked the body off of his blade. He was a black and red-cloaked figure, similar to the demons, though he wore a demonic mask, fully hiding his features. He didn't have horns. He, too, wielded a runesword, coated with insane amounts of ether from weapon enhancement skills.

The mask turned to Vivi. He pointed his hand at the ground beneath her and activated a skill. Her ethereal realm flared warnings, as if a surge was about to erupt beneath her feet.

She immediately activated Momentum Leap, lifting her sword to swing. He was the leader. He was her next target.

Except, her feet wouldn’t move, as if glued to the ground. The leader’s skill did something to her. Under her, a black void replaced the floorboards. Her boots fell in, stuck, as if dipping into a quagmire.

“Oh no,” Lucius said. “Oh no, oh no, ohno, Vivi get out! Get out, now! That’s a legendary skill! We’re dead if we fall!”

She could barely hear him over all the screams as she gritted her teeth, placing all of her energy into lifting her feet, trying to activate Momentum Leap again. Her foot rose by an inch, only to be pulled back to the ground with insane force.

More ether hunters and nobles fell. The Darkwinds were also stuck in the black void with their weapons up. Aolinn was crying and screaming next to her, Lortel close behind with Helegar, all stuck.

The demon-masked leader closed his palm, and by command, the blackness shifted, whirling, as if a portal had opened. The force that kept her boots stuck now pulled her down, dragging inside by a strong pull of gravity. The sensation was similar to being sucked into Uundref’s portal.

She flared her void core. The blackness of the void realm replaced her senses—a sensation that usually made her powerful—except this time, the sensation only clarified the dreadful pull of the whirling void beneath her, so filled with ether that no amount of burning wisps could overpower the portal's pull.

Vivi drove Dawnpour into the floor at the edge of the blackness, holding onto it, and she grabbed Aolinn’s hand, stopping the woman from falling. Everyone else fell into the whirling blackness, including Lortel. Vivi held onto her sword.

But the pressure grew. Her blade cut the floor by the sheer force of the pull, and she fell in with Aolinn.

The darkness of the void realm disappeared as she lost consciousness.