Chapter 227: I Need Space.
I watched from behind the window as my Arisen City stirred into life without me, their supposed Demon Queen. The center of art and culture, this place had become the place for entertainment and all things crafting under Granuel’s firm guidance, and by our selfish requests. His absence was felt, as even I could discern the declining activity. Another layer of homes had been swallowed up by the ever-accelerating encroachment of Pandemonium, squeezing my citizens into an ever-shrinking space. It would only be a matter of time before this entire city was swallowed whole by our curse.
Perhaps it’s for the best. With Granuel dead, there was no one else I could trust to actually lead in my stead, certainly not myself.
But my dead friend had thought of even this possibility, hence he’d prepared just the worst replacement for himself.
“Uggghhhh…” I groaned as I spotted the pink-haired human woman crossing through Pandemonium’s gates.
A deep dark pit opened behind me and I dropped down.
~~~
“OH! Demon Queen Haell Zharignan! Thank you very much for allowing me to meet you today!” the pink-haired human woman waved excitedly as I approached our underground meeting spot. She was wearing a shirt with my face on it, along with all sorts of other merch. “I’ve already deployed all available agents to find those archangel bolts your girlfriend wants! Is there anything else you might need? Anything at all! Just ask, and we shall obey!”
I sighed. This was Pandora. An outright sycophant that borderline worshiped me, even more than anyone worshiped the damned angels.
A part of that tickled my boundless ego, I had to admit. But it was mostly just creepy and I did not like dealing with her.
What was Granuel thinking, naming this idiot as his successor!?
I wanted to just kick her out and find someone less annoying to deal with. Granuel actually gave me full control over the Angelslayer company when I never owned any part of it, so I could theoretically do just that. Pandora’s position was by no means permanent, nor did I ever have to give it to her. Granuel had only asked that I give Pandora a year to prove herself.
There was no way I could deny my friend’s final wish.
“All agents?” I asked Pandora as I sat down. “Surely you didn’t divert everyone to the mission I gave you, right? What about the company’s regular operations?”
“AH!” She started sweating, her eyes already glistening. “I’m sorry! Did I… make a mistake?”
Granuel… How is this idiot the fifth best merchant you’ve seen? HOW!?
That was the claim he’d made, and likely part of why Pandora was named his successor. Yet I could not see it at all! How terrible did every other merchant have to be, for her to be the fifth best in the continent!?
I wished I could shake the answer out of Granuel right now.
“I don’t want the company to go under,” I said, already tired of this conversation. “Though I doubt It’ll grow under me any longer. I’m not built for this.”
Pandora stood up, and performed a perfect bow as big fat tears dropped from her eyes. “I deeply and sincerely apologize for my continued blunders! I’ll make sure to grow it large enough to take over all commerce over all civilizations.”
I winced. “Just… keep the company together, and prevent it from shrinking too much. Grow it if you can. And then divert the other assets you can spare for my designs.”
This was likely the other reason why Granuel had entrusted to me his life’s work, his dream. We both shared one very important goal. My friend wished to strike a blow against the damnable angels from beyond the grave.
I would make sure his final blow landed well.
“I’ll see that it is done!” Pandora exclaimed, but I felt that I still needed to be more clear with my instructions, because I didn’t know if there was anything at all this crazy woman wouldn’t do.
“You were one of Granuel’s best merchants, right? You’ve worked closely with him?”
“Yes! It was an honor! You had a very good and loyal friend in him! It was his best quality!”
I leaked a little bit of my aura, and Pandora shook in instinctive fear, but she definitely did not look afraid. More… excited.
I clicked my tongue, and stated firmly, “He had far more important qualities than his friendship with me.”
“Oh!” Her voice chittered, but she was.,.. Quite admirably able to keep talking without pause. “Well, if you say that it is, then it must be true!”
Granuel… I hope you’re laughing all the way to the next life. Because Pandora is a damn funny final joke.
“Forget it. Just, you know roughly how he ran the company, right?”
“Yes!”
“Basically, just do something similar. Consider it my vision for it.”
“I SEE! That’s so wise! I’ll go do just that!”
“Sure.” I got up and walked away.
“THANK YOU VERY MUCH FOR YOUR TIME!” she shouted from behind myself.
“I WILL TREASURE IT FOREVER!”
“I CAN’T TAKE NOTE OF THIS DUE TO SECRECY, BUT I SWEAR THAT IT’S ALL IN MY HEAD AND I WILL NEVER FORGET!”
I cringed and walked faster.
~~~
“So, we can teleport back to Sweetcheeks Village with this???” Elfernando asked excitedly as we came back to take a look at the Teleportation Room. It was still bare and undesigned. I’d take care of that later.
“Well… that should have been the case. But the mark I left behind collapsed. I think someone tried to tamper with it.”
Elfernando laughed loud and hard. “That sounds like them!”
“And like you,” I pointed out.
“Of course! Who wouldn’t try to tamper with the mark in space you left behind? I want to tamper with it! It’s not fair that only I didn’t get to do it!”
“So you prefer watching, over actually getting to experience the power?”
“I didn’t say that.”
I chuckled. “Fine. I’ll show it to you then.”
I did just as I claimed, activating my Mark of The Beast. It worked instantly, and I found myself at the center of the space!
“Whoa, what!?”
“Where’s the mark? Where’s the mark!?” Elfernando searched in circles from where I disappeared.
I took a look, and sure enough, there was no mark left behind for me to teleport to.
“That’s not how it’s supposed to work…” I wondered aloud. I activated my Mark of The Beast again, and felt the slightest shift in place, a small flicker in reality. I was already where I was meant to be.
“Okay. Something’s weird,” I deduced. “I’ve… never actually tried to teleport home… when I was already home. What the fuck would be the point of that?”
“But the result is different, right? I can feel it!”
“Yes.” I walked out of the teleportation room and tried again. Sure enough, I found myself relocated in a blink. No mark in space was left behind where I could teleport to. There was no strain, no indefinite cooldown until I could use that function of The Mark of The Beast again.
I decided to test the limits of this. I walked across Pandemonium’s hallways over and over as I kept on instantly teleporting back to where I came from. This was still the case once I reached the end of the building and faced its front door.
I looked outside at the courtyard, and felt a measure of trepidation. Like pillars of holy power would come raining down from the sky again. Blood spilled from my mouth as I bit through my lip, for I could not even walk freely about my own home. They dared to take even this away from me. I would not forgive them, I would take away they’d ever built.
I stepped outside. I was being paranoid. There’s no way Angelo and Koraxis were just waiting to snipe me. The Angel’s Demise were keeping busy. It’s in their name! Neither did the archangels have a reason to wait. They could just bombard Pandemonium if they wanted, and that would draw me out.
“Pandemonium. Exit strategy at all times.”
The dark grassy ground underneath me rumbled its agreement.
I initiated the teleport, and achieved much the same result as earlier.
I ran back out and tried again, this time from even further away.
Halfway through the courtyard, I finally experienced just the slightest delay, but enough for me to notice.
“There was something that might have been the beginnings of a mark left behind, but poof and it was gone!” Elfernando informed me. He’d never actually the Mark of The Beast carved in space. He already had his own space magic in his head, and the mana-type floating around to help him comprehend.
I ran all the way to the wall of Pandemonium, and did some more experiments. Moonwash joined me soon after, as I had her informed that we were doing something new. She’d be sad later if she wasn’t invited.
I eventually discovered that I could willingly extend the process of teleportation. Doing so would leave a more solid mark in space. And after many iterations, I finally managed to leave a permanent mark in space from this close-by!
Well, permanent as in it wouldn’t just dissipate on its own anytime soon. But it could still disappear for a number of reasons. More than I assumed, going by how the elves of Elfenando’s home managed to get rid of one.
“Well, I’ll be going then!” I announced as Elfernando and Moonwash watched the latest mark from deep underground. We’d moved the experiments here, just to be sure. Everyone tried to limit their time outside these days because of a possible attack. Fucking archangels…!
“Where to?” Moonwash asked as I clenched my fists in my building rage.
I took a deep breath. “Folded Planes.”
“Oh? That’s interesting. I want to come.”
“Uhhh, I don’t know if it’s safe. The archangels might attack again.”
“They probably won’t. It’s not like we’ll be telling anyone we’ll be there.”
“But still, is that a risk we should take?”
“You’re taking it.”
“And I survived it by myself the last time!”
Moonwash fell deep into contemplation.
I spoke before she could. “Look. You’re right, it’s probably nothing. And… we can’t let those damned angels define us so hard. Make us live in fear. I won’t allow it. But I also just wanna be alone right now, kill on my own, just let it flow, discover some new things. I think I might have had a new epiphany, but it’s way too incomplete, and I wish to confirm some things by myself first. It’d be relaxing.”
“Oh. Then you should’ve just said that.”
“Yeah… Anyway! I’ll bring you a souvenir, and I’ll bring you with me next time, I promise!” I knew she’d been wanting to return to the wonderzone. We were supposed to explore it together last time, when we were interrupted with literally the worst news.
“Okay. Make sure my souvenirs are intact.”
“No promises!” I laughed. The ceiling opened, and I flew up and away.
~~~
It didn’t take long. I soon arrived above The City of Equals Bessiahorn from high in the sky. I only showed my face around the city for a few minutes, before I immediately rushed off towards their wonderzone.
I stopped once I arrived at the border to the Folded Planes. Space was truly folded here, the name didn’t lie. I examined it with my localized dimensional scanner, the constantly shifting dimension ever more apparent to the recently evolved Mutation. I might have been a little overwhelmed again, if I still had so little brains.
My complex computative brain comprehended even this mess of vectors easily. My ritualist one felt the palpable flow of mana inherent to all wonderzones, while at the same time happily theorizing new rituals and spells. My original demon brain helped where it could, adding a new perspective to each problem, for a different framework would always be valuable. I regulated the influence of my innate magics, and kept everything connected, so that I may comprehend today, the tools of slaughter I would use tomorrow.
I walked forward, further into the Folded Planes. I constantly enacted practical tests of my wellspring of ideas. The space around us proved to be much more malleable than normal, making it easier to cast most kinds of space magic. From shrinking space to move faster, enlarging it to ‘slow’ projectiles, and the much easier bends that would nudge an enemy’s attack to where I preferred.
Only the dimensional slice that Moonwash once demonstrated proved to be even more difficult to achieve under these conditions. At least, I believed that it was more difficult. It was hard to tell, when I’d never succeeded once.
Its chaotic cousin, the dimension storm, was what proved to be the easiest to achieve in this environment! The dimensional fabric oh-so-easily broke when I crumpled it, slicing everything up!
My hands bled, and I stopped the dimensional storm for a moment to take off my unhealable armguards, before I then resumed the mutilation of the flesh! For science!
A squirrel suddenly squirreled in between my hooves, and I reacted. I stomped on it, and the creature lost its entire lower half. I was aiming to crush it dead center… but the Folded Planes almost managed to save my prey.
Well, not really. It still died.
The next squirrel wasn’t so lucky. I went semi all out, and the spatial environment was no match against the sheer momentum of my hoof. Neither was the ground, as my hoof sunk into it, and made a small crater.
I felt a worm digging underneath me a short while later, and I did my best to track the creature as it shrunk and expanded either itself or the tunnels it dug. Possibly both.
The holoworm surfaced exactly to the left of me as I predicted, and my fist landed true! I didn’t put my all into that, but I read the monster’s weird trajectory correctly, and then counteracted the surrounding spatial bends with my own magic.
This time, I did not miss.
I savagely pulled the creature up and then beat on its body until it finally stopped moving.
I just… remembered that day. The helplessness when the archangels attacked, of course. But this worm in specific had gotten the better of me before. It was… on a day when Angerly and Luine… and Granuel were still alive. I got so mad when I didn’t notice the worm’s approach, and then failed to stop it from reaching Moonwash, when we were just first exploring this wonderzone.
Those were good times.
~~~
An armored beetle whose shell deflected the pebbles I threw. A swarm of zebra-striped bats that spatially hid and protected themselves increasingly well the more they bunched together. A pair of the same holoworms surfaced and dove over and over again to catch me, and I only stepped out of the way without retaliating. A teleporting mantis grew increasingly agitated as it fled, but I was always there to give the telemanter a friendly tap whenever it reappeared.
It was a rare show of restraint and mercy from myself. Maybe I was finally growing up.
I used all three of my minds to observe these creatures in their habitat, and how they affected this space. I examined and began to understand their varying effects on it. I gave them my full focus, I did not let them escape.
It became dizzying again, once I gathered them all at the same spot. I taunted them with my devilish stare, and we frolicked around this wasteland of grey. I slowly overcame my nausea, as I worked to keep my dimensional scanner alert and active no matter the kaleidoscope of spatial effects.
I began to copy it all, the powers they showed. That was the reason why I had come here in the first place! To steal and devour their innate properties and techniques! I was inspired to master space, this strange new element could’ve been what saved us when the archangel nation attacked!
I squeezed in between two boulders that I had no business fitting in. My magic failed a little, and my armor scraped the stone, but I was making progress. That earlier beetle’s carapace innately bent the space around it, to redirect blows in the best angle for it. I did the same thing; I got better not only in making those dimensional curvatures, but I also discovered the best angles to aim for, and against different sorts of attacks. From the scythes of the telemanter, to the sheer mass of the holoworms.
And then there was the crowning jewel of this expedition. I gave special attention to the telemanter that kept on teleporting around me. The way it used its space mana, to warp the dimension around. It was… a genuine change, a transformation unlike anything I’d ever seen! …Except perhaps for my own Mark of The Beast, but that was hardly practical in combat.
A headache ran through my whole body. I had to find another telemanter at some point, as this was truly the hardest fucking spell to ever comprehend, and the other mantis ran out of mana on me. It remained so difficult, even when I was a genius of three brains. No one else could possibly comprehend this.
But… after much thought and experimentation… I believed I finally understood! I had the skeleton of a framework, at least! This was the best I could do on my own.
I really should’ve brought Moonwash. Why did I insist on being alone?
I compiled and reorganized the best of my current theories in my minds before I left.
Basically, at the very basic level, the process of teleportation involved conjuring a semi-dimension for my body, and then another semi-dimension of the same kind at my destination as an anchor of sorts. I then had to connect the two disparate points through a tether of the same semi-dimension and then have one dimensional content be vomited out to the other! Easy!
…I hadn’t succeeded once.
I glanced back at my monstrous teachers and experimental subject, and finally noticed that they were all dead-tired. Plenty of them had fallen well behind, buoyed only by the reflection of my own boundless anger. They kept on chasing after me who they believed to be their greatest enemy. No one cared that it was hurting them too.
That’s nice. I gave them a beaming smile, before I killed them all.
I held them down, and did my best to do the very minimum amount needed to end them, using a far more precise dagger. I was sure that Moonwash would appreciate the present!
I initiated my Mark of The Beast, with a newfound appreciation for my innate long distance teleportation.