Chapter 35. Home
Hel.
It is said that ten million years ago, when the Primordials still roamed the world, this was the most beautiful continent.
It had a name then: Aeverath. The accounts varied on what the word meant in the old tongue; some scholars claimed it translated to "eternal spring," others insisted it meant "garden of bliss." Sael had read both interpretations and found them equally pretentious. The Primordials hadn't been particularly poetic, from what he understood. They'd been enormous, powerful, and about as subtle as a mountain falling on your head.
Regardless of linguistic arguments, the continent had apparently been lovely. Perpetual mild weather, fertile soil, rivers that ran clear and sweet. Then, one day, the Primordial of Order and the Primordial of Chaos had a disagreement.
The historical texts didn't specify what they'd been arguing about. Sael suspected it had been something catastrophically stupid, because entities of incomprehensible power rarely fought over matters of actual importance. More likely it was something like "which direction is better" or "who made this mountain" or some other philosophical nonsense that only made sense if you were an immortal being with too much time on your hands.
They'd exchanged a single blow. One attack from each, and the shockwave restructured the continent.
Half of it froze solid. Eternal winter descended in an instant, temperatures plummeting so far that the air itself crystallized in some parts. Ice spread across thousands of kilometers in a matter of hours, entombing forests, lakes, and whatever unfortunate creatures happened to be present at the time.
The other half caught fire. The ground itself ignited, volcanoes erupted from places that had never had volcanoes. Lava flows carved new rivers through the landscape. Geysers punched through bedrock and sent superheated steam kilometers into the air. The temperature became hot enough to turn sand into glass, and stayed that way.
And in between the two halves...
Richter's voice carried oddly in the thin air. They were floating several hundred meters above what could generously be called landscape and uncharitably be called a geological nightmare.
Sael looked down at the narrow band of terrain below them. Lava pools glowed like scattered embers across the dark rock, their surfaces rippling with convection currents. Steam vents hissed and spat, sending white plumes spiraling upward before the air currents caught them and tore them apart. To the north, ice cliffs rose like walls, their surfaces reflecting the red glow from the south. To the south, rivers of molten rock carved glowing paths through blackened stone.
And here, in between, was the zone where both extremes met and cancelled each other out into something merely hostile instead of instantly fatal. This was where Sael and his mother lived.
"Hmm," Sael said.
Richter waited.
"This was a confirmation hmm," Sael added. "Obviously."
Koleen suppressed a laugh.
Sael began to descend. The air grew warmer as he dropped, heat rising from the lava pools below mixing with the cold currents bleeding off the ice to the north. The temperature fluctuated wildly with each meter—hot, cold, hot, cold—creating layers of air that pushed against each other in constant turbulence.
Koleen followed, bringing Richter with him in a levitation field. The older mage adjusted their descent to match Sael's pace, navigating the thermal currents with ease.
Sael's feet touched stone.
The ground was dark basalt, worn smooth in some places and jagged in others. Cracks ran through the rock like spiderwebs, some of them glowing faintly with the heat of magma flowing beneath. A lava pool bubbled thirty meters to his left, its surface thick and sluggish. The air smelled of sulfur and something else, a sharp, mineral scent that Sael had almost forgotten.
Home.
He walked forward a few steps, his boots crunching on loose gravel. The temperature here was tolerable, hovering somewhere around what most people would consider a very hot summer day. Steam vents dotted the landscape, releasing pressure from the superheated water trapped in pockets beneath the surface. One hissed nearby, sending a white column of vapor into the air. The vapor rose, hit a cold current, and condensed into droplets that fell as scalding rain a hundred meters away.
Koleen and Richter landed beside him and for a long moment, none of them spoke.
The hedmaster was staring at the landscape with an expression that was difficult to read. Not horror, exactly. More like... fascination mixed with disbelief. His eyes moved from the lava pools to the ice cliffs to the steam vents, taking in the impossible geography.
Then Koleen's expression changed. His eyes widened slightly, his breath caught.
"The mana here is..." he started, then stopped. He frowned, searching for words. "It's..."
He trailed off again, clearly struggling.
"Pure?" Sael offered.
"No. Yes. But also—" Koleen gestured vaguely at the air around them. "It's dense. And concentrated. But not chaotic. It's like..." He shook his head. "I don't have a word for this."
Sael smiled.
It was a small expression, barely there, but genuine. "Yes," he said simply. "I grew up on this."
Koleen turned to stare at him. His expression suggested he was reevaluating several things about Sael's magical development.
Sael looked ahead, toward a path that wound between two lava pools. The stone there was darker, worn by countless footsteps over years. His footsteps. His mother's. His master's.
"We should walk from here," he said.
Both men nodded.
Sael started forward, then paused. He glanced back at them.
"I wish to take some time," he said quietly. "If you don't mind."
Richter's expression softened slightly. "Of course."
Koleen simply nodded.
Sael turned back to the path and began to walk.