Neophyte World Builder

CROWN

I found Sena sitting with Muerve, Akasha, and Kelas. They were, somewhat strangely, on a large boat… a similar boat to the one that I’d met Wanderer upon not that long ago, by my reckoning. The boat wasn’t on the ocean, but flying through the sky, but it was still an unusual choice.

“Not the gathering I expected to find,” I admitted in a mild tone. Artemis—once more taking the appearance of a young elf—popped into existence beside me. I’d left Grem behind to monitor things, not that I’d given him access to Regalia yet. Until I knew more about how much of his behavior was an act and how much was trouble, I didn’t want to give him too much to work with.

“We’ve been talking a lot,” Sena replied with a quirk of her lip. It was almost a smile, something that looked so different on her youthful face. “You’ve really spoiled me by showing me so much, you know. I considered asking you to do what you did with Wanderer and just wipe my memory every time I go down to live a life.”

The casual mention of this had me rubbing the back of my head. I was in Kenta’s body at the moment, since I’d come to meet Sena, though I’d been trying other shapes of late. Her statement was what really bothered me. I’d been neglecting her a little, even though I valued her company… I was a bad friend.

“Sorry I couldn’t be around more for you during this period,” I muttered. “I can do that for you, of course. I appreciate your point of view, but I have no right to hold you here.” While I spoke, I looked around at the others, as their presence was still strange for this sort of meeting.

Muerve, in his favored rooken form, fluffed up his feathers. “Don’t be an idiot, Crown,” he chirped. The death god had learned to treat me with some respect, but he’d never tempered his opinion when among friends. The bird huffed loudly, “We may not have your perspective, but we are not stupid. We know by now you deal in other worlds that we can never see. You’re annoying and forgetful, but we do want to help.”

“Talking with Akasha about Tastka and what I know about that situation gave me an idea,” Kelas said with a wiggle of his ears. “We also know you took someone from another world and dropped her into ours. I’m not sure why you did that, but it gave us some ideas.”

I had a feeling I knew where this was going, and I wasn’t sure I liked it. From the way I heard Artemis snickering beside me, I had a feeling the Terminal knew as well. She really was just Orpheus as a brat, wasn’t she?

“You’re wanting to jump over to the world I showed you, aren’t you?” I asked Sena. “I’m not sure I should do that. Sara was an experiment and while she worked, she also ended up pretty angry at me.”

“She’s angry because she doesn’t understand what you want out of her, and she doesn’t believe us when we tell her we don’t want anything,” Akasha pointed out. “And you’re not wrong, but we have something a little more complicated.”

Artemis flicked her tail as she stepped forward, poking me in the side. “It’s worked out pretty well for you so far, doing things that are crazy for the rest of us. Now you can afford to mess up a little… though I guess you’re running a bit low on energy.”

I grunted, but said nothing. The last time I’d done something big without enough energy, it had sent my world thirteen hundred years into the future, and I still hadn’t taken the time to get to know it. That realization made me wince, but it wasn’t a problem I could think about right now.

“Fine, what’s the idea then? What do you want me to do?” I crossed my arms and looked about, meeting each gaze—god, System, and mortal—in turn. I tried to look serious, but none of them were fazed at all by my expression.

“Don’t be like that,” Sena sighed with a smile. “It’s… something we’ve all worked out. You said once that I’d see you when you shouldn’t be seen. I think we should remember that and develop it. You’ve told Akasha and myself enough about what you’re doing that I think I can help you and… fix a concern of mine.”

Since it was her asking, I just nodded. I settled on the railing of the ship, idly grabbing onto a rope to steady myself. No real need, in the afterlife, but it felt right.

It was Akasha who stepped forward to explain, though.

“You’re going to make another incarnation,” she said bluntly. “Kelas told us about Tastka’s visions, and I figured out what you did. I wasn’t really a thinking being back then, but I have some impressions, and I can help you control it better this time… especially because the dream realm in Versus is already a layer instead of how you arranged it earlier.”

I raised an eyebrow, but they weren’t done with the idea yet.

“I will be your companion,” Sena offered. “I’m told you will not remember anything, so I will guide you subtly. Akasha informs me that this is something that should be allowed, and even beneficial. With the two of us, we can spread the word of the mythology that you want… and I can keep an eye on it as well.”

Muerve fluffed up his feathers as he added his own opinion. “I do not know how you are handling your souls in this other realm, but I have touched the one you brought in. While she feels different, she is integrating well. The damage I felt when you pulled her from her home is no longer present.”

My hand went up in a sign to halt. “Woah, hold on,” I objected. “It’s… not that it’s fundamentally a bad idea. Using an incarnation to get to know the world is a good one, and… look, I get it. Thing is, I just can’t react as fast as I could if I left myself the freedom of incarnations. Even if I took a human or something short-lived, that could be decades that I’m unavailable.”

I saw Akasha about to say something, but I shook my head. “I’m not finished,” I continued. “Sena, I appreciate what you’re offering… it would be nice to go through a life with someone I already knew, even if I don’t remember them. The problem is… I won’t have my memories. You’ll be facing me shaped by whatever life I’m living there, and there’s no guarantee I’ll be the kind of person you can tolerate… or that I’d ever listen to you. It’s risky.”

It was Kelas who broke into my complaints with his own logic. “None of us know the details of how things work, but we’ve been discussing this for a while, and we aren’t being reckless.” He gestured to Akasha. “Akasha says she can prevent and control a lot of the problems that happened when you were Tastka. I’m not sure what those were, but she says there were some. Muerve thinks the idea has merit, and Sena’s perfectly willing to give it a try.”

Akasha perked up her ears. “This is also the best time for you to do this! The time difference is narrowing the farther along Versus gets in its epochs. If you do it now, you can live an entire lifetime and only a couple of years pass in Regalia. You’ll be in your sanctuary when your mortal body sleeps, too. Just like before, you can work on things… though I guess you’ll only have a couple of hours of Regalia time each time you sleep, because of the time difference.”

The arguments made sense, but I still hesitated. “Tastka really affected how I think of the world… Duck even called me too attached to the elves, and maybe that’s why Akasha is too. I really do want to be careful about incarnations, all right? What if something goes wrong? What if nobody will listen? I can’t just go down there and start a religion, it has to actually have people spreading it aside from me, and it will need believers.”

“Excuses,” Sena laughed, waving off the problem. “I’ll be there to help you out, not court you. Do you really think I can’t set that aside for the mission? If you stray from the task, I’ll nudge you. If you outright fail, I’ll kill you and we can start again with a fresh incarnation, or you can abandon the project.”

I flinched at the glib claim that she would murder me if I strayed too far. Her background made me believe she could do it, though a small part of me had hoped our time together and her mellowing with age had made her less prone to such a simple and bloodily efficient solution. I also wasn’t sure it was something I wanted.

Memories of Kenta’s life flashed through my head. The boy had largely been inoffensive and peaceful, though he’d had a few violent confrontations in his life, and occasionally hunted. Of course, he’d also hunted his Totem, but that was just a typical thing that tribals did when they were vaskan. Overall, he’d been a pretty content boy despite the lack of technological comforts.

His death—my death, technically—had been sudden and induced a confused panic. Just toppling over dead was what people saw, but it wasn’t instant. I could clearly remember the realization that my heart had stopped, and even without pain there was a suffocating feeling. It had not been pleasant.

“I think you should do it,” Artemis said, breaking the silence of my thoughts. Everyone looked at the tiny elf girl, who crossed her arms and wiggled her ears in annoyance. I raised an eyebrow at her.

“They’ve put a lot of thought into this, and you should trust your friends,” Artemis continued softly. “They can’t comprehend what you are, but that doesn’t mean they’re useless. Orpheus would never allow it, but even she would have agreed that you have figured out an incarnation exploit that very few others have managed. It’s a waste that you haven’t ever used it past that first time.”

I grumbled softly, “Things got a little out of hand, and living an entire lifetime while trying to do things became… distracting. I think I might want to skip a lot more this time, but I’m also paranoid about something like another invasion of incursions hitting while I’m busy, and I’ll have to handle it in those segments of hours when the mortal me is asleep.”

Akasha flicked her ears down in an elven glare, her nose wrinkling up. “You do know that the incursions kept going for a while after you fell asleep, right? We had to handle them alone, without your support. We aren’t helplessly flailing our arms while you’re busy, father. And you have a Terminal now to help with stuff anyway. What if you’d had Duck while you were Tastka?”

“I’m not sure I want Grem doing all that stuff,” I muttered. “But I see your point. What about being High Administrator? What if I’m needed for that?”

“Switchboard handles most of those,” Artemis reminded me. “And the ones that they can’t… remember that the time difference between your new world and the rest of the cluster is even more extreme. You could spend a whole lifetime down there and it would be a fraction of a cycle for everyone else.”

Sena smiled, and I knew she’d put them up to this somehow. The worst part was… I kind of wanted to do it. The argument made sense, in a way, and it would be good to truly test the incarnation exploit that I’d barely used with Tastka.

“I’ll think about it,” I sighed.