The Weight of Legacy

The avalanche of questions barreling through Malwine's mind was the only thing that kept her from immediately blurring out additional questions. They practically trampled over each other, and despite the odds, anything she tried to ask would have come off far less eloquently than a simple ‘what the fuck’.

Where could she even begin? Every time she started to parse something, the next thing she noticed had her spiraling all over again.

Unbelievably, perhaps she'd been overestimating her own problems. Between her Timeless {Legacy} and just {Foresight} in general, she'd gotten used to assuming she just had too many abnormally powerful or otherwise peculiar Affinities to ever risk revealing them. Yet here was Veit, casually having Affinities with better tiers than either she or Adelheid had. He probably had far bigger problems than she did, so why did he have no qualms about being this open?

Hell, he had {Vanagloria}! The memory was more than fresh enough for Malwine to recall that among those listed by Fastēn as Affinities connected to the Devils. And it was labeled as Proclivity, to boot. That wasn't a term she'd seen in this context before.

It took every shred of willpower within for her to avoid tripping over herself to start questioning that Devil-related Proclivity.

“Okay,” Malwine blinked, her gaze lingering on a particular line. “What the fuck is {Alienans}?”

“That is what caught your eye?” Veit laughed, brushing his long hair back with a hand. It was the type of gesture that was hard to interpret as either genuine amusement or nervousness—she was still long ways off from being able to read him consistently. “My mother’s signature Affinity. It changes. It is admittedly difficult to explain with words alone—it’s an Affinity of altering, usually by omission.”

Malwine couldn’t help but raise an eyebrow. What does ‘signature’ mean in this context? Don’t all Affinities come from somewhere? She was used to things being described that way when they were unique or somehow… individual. “‘Signature’? What’s a signature Affinity?”

“Hm. Think of it as an Affinity that’s been… grown intentionally. Instead of being improved by the passage of generations, it’s improved intentionally. Some families have signature Affinities they cultivated over less than a millennium, a relatively short time. It must be trained and pushed to higher tiers deliberately.”

That ‘under a thousand years’ qualified as little time was a sharp reminder of how incompatible this world could be with her lingering views at times. The widow’s age and vocation might have somewhat inured her to dealing with events that happened over many years, but Malwine had yet to truly adjust to how massive the difference was.

“I did sometimes wonder if I could raise the tiers of mine,” Malwine admitted. “How does it change, if you don't mind my asking?”

“I assume you mean {Alienans}? Hm,” Veit nodded. He summoned another piece of crystalline glass, its colors shifting as it settled and cracked. Unlike the one he'd used for his lecture, this one appeared to lack any specific patterns.

Abruptly, it stilled. It came into focus, reality itself seeming to center around it for the instant it took for it to shudder and shatter, first to glass and then something smaller and smaller, until sand in a variety of unnatural colors hit the ground.

Despite its nature as a construct, the sand did not fade once Veit stopped moving. Of all things, that was what somehow got Malwine even more curious. When she used [Shieldwork], her shields only existed so long as they were tied to the ability. They simply disappeared afterwards, and they certainly didn't leave anything behind.

“It denies, it unmakes,” Veit gave the sand a pensive look, despite it being of his own making. “But it does not destroy. It changes.”

How do I get this man into my family tree so I can steal this shit from him?

Malwine shook her head, dismissing the unrealistic thought. She settled for the far more realistic course of action, of just addressing the elephant in the room. “{Bone} and {Mosaic}, I've seen in your not-kites. But pardon—isn't {Vanagloria} a… Devil thing? Actually, can I get a lecture on that? Johann Fastēn taught us, yes, but he just… he's a bit of a character.”

“It is a Proclivity, long since given by a Devil,” the forester agreed. “Do you know what sets a Proclivity apart from an Affinity?”

“No. I'd never even seen one of those before.”

“The short of it is that they are passed on by guideparents chosen at birth, not by blood,” Veit explained. Of course they call them guideparents instead of godparents here. “Beyond that, they're no different than Affinities, beyond originating with the Devils… It has been long since I last spoke of this. How much have you learned about the Devils’ Kingdom in those history lessons the royalist was going to give you? I forewarn you may grow to regret asking about this, if you value your time. Though I believe you have no other lessons today.”

Now I'm really curious about the politics wherever the capital is, if someone with {Vanagloria} can use ‘royalist’ as a derogatory term… “Hold up, is my schedule public knowledge?”

“Not yours in particular—your family household staff treat anything related to your aunt Adelheid Rīsanin as if it were material from a gossip pamphlet. It's almost disorienting, not to mention—”

Malwine had to stop herself from correcting him, given how her sister went by Adelheid fon Hūdijanin now, but explaining that if she let it slip would be tortuous.

“—you're a far more interesting case, between the strange circumstances of your arrival and your accelerated core development.”

“Yes, thank the Devils,” Malwine scoffed—she could do without being gossip material, as Adelheid apparently was. The curse that left her lips had her pondering the oddity of using seeming historical figures for something like that. Even the concept of cursing ‘in any Devil's name’ was bizarre when contrasted to the foundational role they supposedly played. “But no, I'm not sure I know much at all. He told us about how there were thirteen Executors, one betrayed the others, and the Kingdom ended up splintered into the nations of today.”

“...That's an oversimplification, but it works. Prince Florian of {Bonds} levied a number of accusations against his equals, from the tame to the absurd—he claimed {Descent}’s Executor was an omen of how they were all falling to decadence, that {Vanagloria}’s was an impostor, and that {Tristitia}’s led a double life as a courtesan, among many others. The offenses he dispensed were so numerous and unforgivable that he saw no way out other than being the first to strike.”

“That is more detailed than what Johann Fastēn told us, honestly. How do you know all that, by the way? Were you there?”

“I am far from that old!” Veit seemed genuinely outraged. “None save Immortals could live that long—and before you ask, yes, there are or were Immortals out there who witnessed the Kingdom's fall. Their accounts are some of the most enduring sources about the time.”

“Sure, sure,” Malwine rolled her eyes. “I'm sure that ‘joke’ of yours that would have you been upwards of a thousand years old, maybe thousand-eight-hundred at most, was indeed just a joke?”

“...I confess I don't recall which instance you're referring to.”

“When you first barged into our room and said you were from the 3000s when questioned.”

“Oh,” Veit blinked slowly. “Malwine.”

“That is indeed my name.”

“Malwine.”

“What?”

“How much is five minus three?”

“Two. Why?”

The forester stared at her, now unblinking. Given what they'd just discussed, she could only guess it had something to do with the matter of whether he'd been serious about being born in the 3000s. Since that would make him, what, close to three thousand…

Oh. Fuck.

“Oh, no.”

Veit started laughing.

“Sure, laugh!” Malwine covered her face, accruing a minuscule amount of [Toll] to make the act feel as it should despite her current state. “We all make mistakes!”

Within, the embarrassment was such that she had half a mind to just flee and end the lesson by dismissing the double.

“It's fine,” the asshole with Timeless {Vanagloria} did a terrible job at suppressing his continued snickers.

“Oh, come on, I even said it at the time. Couldn't you have corrected me?”

“You do realize I was struggling to understand why my search for an elderly intruder led me to you, no?”

Malwine stilled, lowering her hands as she found herself scowling intently. “You didn't notice either, did you?”

“No,” Veit conceded. “In any case, the Devils’ Kingdom indeed had thirteen Executors at the helm, but to speak of Proclivities, one must first understand how said Executors came into peer in the first place.”

The story has been illicitly taken; should you find it on Amazon, report the infringement.

“Hey, don't change the subject.”

“This has always been the subject. Each of the original Executors had a tale for how they attained such a status, some more believable than others. All tales share a refusal to reveal the exact circumstances of how they were first connected to the Devils, and of what said Devils look like. There is always a gap between their origin and how they became Executors, all revealing themselves on the same day, all claiming they could share the Devils’ power.”

“...Because they're Proclivities?”

“Yes. At the time, there were… there were still gods under the waves. You are ridiculously lucky in that you boast five Affinities. That is far from the norm, and anomalous enough that I suspect our paths would have crossed sooner than later, even if you hadn't sent your double to me. But I digress. Things were just as they are now, then—most people were born mortal, and most who cultivated would not have enough to reach Immortality. That made the divide between those who stylized themselves as gods and the majority of the population insurmountable enough. The strongest could and would bend this world to their whims.”

Until the Devils got involved, Malwine realized. She could see where this was going, especially considering what the antiquarian had said.

“Supposedly, some gods were killed. Most were exiled to beyond the waves. From then on, the Devils left all matters for the Executors to handle—that initial intervention, in introducing their power, was the only direct action they were ever known to take.”

She frowned. “Fastēn said Devils were objects, though.”

To her surprise, Veit nodded. “Exactly,” he shot her a conspiratorial look. “It's generally accepted that someone—or something—else was involved. But none who knew shared that information, and now far too long has passed for it to be recovered.”

Oh, just you wait. Malwine was ready to add this to that long list of questions she periodically remembered she could simply check on—and to that list of things she liked to imagine she could somehow find answers to through {Legacy}’s bullshit.