Chapter 80 – Such Is the Fate of Genius
They waited a few minutes for Aelia to get the signal that Varra was ready. Orestis spent the time bracing for the second-hand embarrassment he knew was coming.
In his opinion, they should have just gone to see the lich unannounced. Much less time for her to prepare a spectacle. They did not even need to gate into the lab—simply appearing outside and ringing the bell would have been enough.
Courtesy? What’s that? I would rather preserve my sanity. Well, metaphorically.
After all, one of his problems was that he was unable to lose his mind. That, however, didn’t mean he wanted to see anything cringeworthy.
And now, no thanks to Aelia, Varra had been given ample warning to prepare exactly that. There was no telling what she would be putting together.
Speaking of Aelia—she really was nothing like her counterpart. No dramatics, no eccentricities, not prone to foolishness… pretty much the opposite of Varra in nearly every respect.
Now isn’t that interesting?
Could it be that they really were opposites of each other? Was that a consequence of splitting the soul? Or did Varra simply draw the short straw and inherit all the insufferable parts?
Actually, now that the others had finished their conversations, there was no reason for him to remain quiet any more. The only reason he hadn’t bothered to say anything this whole time was to let Maxim and Eirene talk and reach their own conclusions about Aelia.
“Are the differences in your personalities—the fact that you are almost opposites of each other—a result of the split?” he asked.
Aelia turned to him and nodded. “Yes. At the time, I thought it was a good idea to divest myself of most of my unwanted traits. It didn’t turn out quite as I’d hoped.”
So it was a deliberate choice?
Orestis found himself pitying the woman. Not quite as she’d hoped was putting it generously; who in their right mind would want someone like Varra connected to their thoughts for eternity?
That’s less of a soul-splitting technique and more a self-inflicted punishment.
“Wait, you dumped all of your negative traits into Varra? No wonder she became a menace on par with this guy in the future,” Maxim said, gesturing at Orestis.
Orestis chose not to rise to the bait in favour of giving Aelia a pointed look. Because the idiot did have a point. Whatever made her think doing something like that was a good idea?
Although… now that I think about it, it does explain a great deal.
Varra’s foolishness had to have come from somewhere. Clearly it had always been part of the woman’s personality—only that it had been kept in check by other traits such as restraint, judgement, and common sense. Apparently, when she split her soul, she decided to keep them all for the Aelia half, leaving none for Varra.
It wasn’t just him either; even Maxim and Eirene were looking at Aelia with expressions reserved for people who accomplished great feats of idiocy.
“It wasn’t all of the negative traits,” Aelia said defensively. “Just ninety-five percent of each. And even for the ones I kept, I gave her five percent of each of those as well.”
“Any particular reason for the number?” Orestis asked, genuinely curious. That was an oddly specific value.
“Yes, actually,” Aelia replied. “I discovered that removing a hundred percent of any emotion or trait left a person… less than human.”
Orestis nodded. That made sense. This was the soul they were talking about; there was no such thing as an optional part when it came to the soul. Everything—even the most insignificant portion—served a purpose.
Having less of something was not the same as having none.
Create a gaping hole where an essential component was supposed to be and… well, whatever remained would certainly not be ‘human’.
“And how would you know that?” Eirene asked, latching onto that particular detail.
Orestis grimaced. She really was too perceptive for her own good. The answer was, of course, the obvious one. There was only one way Aelia could have known such a thing: prior human experimentation.
“I was a very different person before the split,” Aelia replied, her expression genuinely remorseful. “Right now, both of our personalities are completely different from who we used to be, originally.”
Eirene narrowed her eyes. But she did not say anything despite the fact that Aelia had very purposely avoided answering the question.
A moment later, Aelia said, “Looks like she’s ready.” Then she got up.
Orestis suppressed a sigh at the thought of what they were about to walk into. Still, it was better to just get it over with instead of waiting and guessing.
Like pulling out a splinter. Much less painful when it’s over quickly.
However, just to console himself, he poured another cup of tea and carried it with him as he stood. The flavour was a new one—something he hadn’t tried before. It was quite pleasant. Good for his mood. It might help him feel less annoyed by whatever Varra had come up with.
Aelia used mana—Fourth Circle, from the feel of it—to open a gate into one of the caverns of Varra’s hideout. It was not one of the lab areas, Orestis noted as he stepped through with the others. Varra must have told Aelia which cavern she wanted them to arrive in.
The area they were in was well lit—but only the near half of the chamber. The far half had been artificially darkened. As in, it was completely blacked out, as though shrouded in a veil of shadows and darkness. Which was probably what Varra had been going for.
Then, as they watched, the darkness began to recede, peeling back to reveal a stone throne carved to depict hundreds of tormented souls. Varra sat upon it with one leg crossed over the other, chin resting on her hand. Her black robes spilled over the sides like liquid shadow. Behind her hung a gigantic, blood-red illusionary moon.
The black and white wings of opposing alignments unfurled from her back. Several lengths of spectral chain ran from the moon to bind her to it. Above her head floated a jagged crown of black crystal, encircled by slowly rotating crimson runes.
Then, Varra swept an arm out dramatically and, in a sepulchral voice, said, “At last. The bearers of destiny stand before me.”
Nobody said anything for several seconds. Varra held her pose on the throne, motionless.
Orestis glanced at the others. Eirene actually had her mouth hanging open in shock. Maxim looked completely dumbfounded. Orestis felt a modicum of satisfaction from seeing their reactions.
As for Aelia, she was glaring at Varra, her face red with embarrassment.
Finally Maxim turned to Orestis and said, while pointing a finger at Varra, “That is the Deathless Calamity?”
“Now you understand what I mean?” Orestis said dryly.
“She’s… not what I expected,” Eirene offered.
“I’ll say.” Maxim was still staring. “The history books certainly never mentioned this. She looks about two seconds away from covering one eye and explaining why the dragon sealed inside her must never be released.”
Varra shot upright and jabbed a finger at him. “You, are you a genius!?”
Both Orestis and Aelia turned to glare at the idiot in unison. Why was he trying to make things worse than they already were?
“Stop giving strange ideas to young impressionable girls!” Aelia scolded Maxim. Then, she turned to Varra. “And you. Put that away! So embarrassing!”
Maxim, unrepentant as ever, said, “To be fair, it’s quite impressive when you consider that she put that together in four minutes.”
“See? He understands,” Varra said. Although she did, mercifully, begin dispelling everything. Most of those things were magical constructs. The throne, unfortunately, was not.
When did she even carve that?
Regardless, she did not need people giving her new ideas; the ones she already had were bad enough.
“Stop encouraging her. You have no idea how bad it can get,” Orestis said to Maxim, and Aelia nodded fervently at his side.
Maxim looked between the two of them, looking quite amused. “You guys must have had it rough. But I can see why you said she’s harmless.”
“Hey! Who’s harmless? I’m an evil lich. Evil liches can’t be harmless!” Varra declared. “Orestis, you can’t go around saying nice things about me behind my back!”
“That’s not all he’s been saying,” Maxim said gleefully. “Did you know he told us you were a guy?”
“What? How rude! How could you think that? Are you blind? What part of me looks like a guy? Idiot! Dummy! Blockhead! Moron!”
As Varra launched into a barrage of childish insults, Orestis gave Maxim a deadpan look and said, “You’re enjoying this, aren’t you?”
The idiot grinned. “Very much so.”
While Aelia worked on calming Varra down, Eirene drifted closer and said quietly, “She seems like a handful. Is she always like this?”
“More or less,” Orestis said. “Although, she is being a bit more animated than usual.”
“Sorry, she’s just excited to have guests,” Aelia said, walking over with Varra in tow.
Somehow, the healer had managed to nag and coax Varra into pushing back the cowl and dropping the perpetual smoky haze she kept around her shoulders.
This was the first time Orestis had seen Varra’s face, too. She always had the cowl pulled up, and a magical darkness covering everything except her mouth and chin.
What it had been hiding was the pale face of a young girl with dark hair and eyes. Varra, he noted, was still glaring at him. Evidently, she was holding a grudge.
“Before anything else,” Aelia said to him, “Varra would like an explanation from you regarding the part where you mistook her for a man.”
Well, I suppose I do owe her that much.
So he went over the story. Again. But even at the end of it, Varra was still unmoved and entirely unconvinced.
“You think an explanation is enough? You need to do better than that. A maiden’s pure heart has been hurt!” she announced, arms crossed, chin turned haughtily to the side.
Orestis immediately wanted to point out that there were several things wrong with that sentence.
But at that moment, Maxim stepped forward and said, “In the interest of getting a clearer picture, can you show us how Varra looked in the future?”
While speaking, he also made the hand sign for illusion. Orestis understood what the idiot was asking for well enough. It was more than likely he was scheming something. Still, Orestis decided to play along.
He created an illusion of the Varra he remembered; the inhuman skeleton wrapped in a dark cloak.
Varra looked quite proud to see it again—she had seen it before when he’d sent her the memory. As for Aelia, she looked like she was in pain. Nothing physical, of course. More like she was taking mental damage.
I guess Varra hadn’t shared that memory. Probably wanted to show it later after the body was complete?
“Not bad, not bad,” Maxim said, nodding. “And how did she sound?”
Orestis layered sound into the illusion, letting the figure speak. He limited it to a simple ‘greetings’—there was no way he was replaying any of the lich’s actual lines.
I don’t want to suffer mental damage from my own spell.
Especially since a single word was more than enough for the purpose. The voice came out like a harrowing whisper of a thousand voices.
Varra lit up even more at that, openly delighted by her own ingenuity, oblivious to Aelia quietly dying inside beside her.
“I see now,” Maxim said, nodding sagely. “I have solved the mystery.”
“What mystery?” Varra asked.
Maxim made a grand gesture at the illusion and said, “Clearly, Orestis was so thoroughly awed and terrified by the impression you made upon your first meeting, that it addled his senses. Under such conditions, he was lucky that mistaking your gender was all that happened. He could have gone mad! Insensate!”
Orestis, Aelia—and even Eirene—gave the idiot a deadpan look. None of them were impressed with his nonsense.
Well, except for one person.
The last of Varra’s indignation vanished as she broke into laughter. “Yes, that makes perfect sense,” she said, completely falling for his words. “I suppose it’s understandable; my presence was simply too overwhelming. Ah—such is the fate of genius.”
“Indeed, indeed,” Maxim agreed. “The real miracle is that he walked away with his sanity mostly intact.”
“You’re clearly a man of culture,” Varra said happily as she slapped Maxim on his shoulder a couple of times. “Anyway, let’s talk about what you said before. Which eye should I cover for the best effect? Right or left?”
Orestis found himself feeling a bit annoyed with how quickly she was getting all chummy with the idiot.
“You do realise,” he said, “that he was planning to kill you until about five minutes ago.”
Varra blinked. “Wait, really? Aelia already shared her memories with me.” She turned to Maxim. “She thinks you won’t kill us since she’s going to be the Saintess. You won’t, right?”
Maxim shrugged. “Well, yes, I don’t intend to kill you anymore. But you still released a plague on the masses. You can’t expect me to turn a blind eye to that, can you?”
“Yeah, you’ve got a point…” Varra said, rubbing her chin. “But no one died. Doesn’t that count for something?”
“No one died this time,” Maxim said. “History—although it hasn’t happened yet—has shown that you’ll be responsible for a great many deaths down the line.”
“As you said,” Aelia cut in, “it hasn’t happened yet. I’ll make sure to stop her.”
Maxim smiled at her. “No offence, but the fact that it reached the history books at all means you couldn’t stop her.”
Aelia had no answer for that. She frowned, then turned to Varra. “Varra. Do you really plan to go out and kill people?”
Varra shyly tapped her two index fingers together, looking off to the side. “Well… that is… not yet. But I kinda have to, you know? Part of the job, being a lich and all that.”
“Varra,” Aelia said, her frustration clearly showing. “You promised.”
“As an evil lich, I am allowed to break promises,” she replied reasonably.
Such impeccable logic. Orestis took a sip of his tea and sighed. I’m glad this is not my problem.
The two stared silently at each other for several seconds after that. From the minute changes in their expressions, Orestis could tell that they were having a conversation mentally. Much faster, and more comprehensive than using words, if his own experiences with soul communication were anything to go by.
Maxim watched for a moment before raising a finger. “I have a suggestion.”
The two turned to him with understandably similar expressions.
“If I’m not mistaken, it’s not the murders that are truly important,” he said. “But rather, it’s the reputation as an impossibly powerful and terrifying lich. The real goal is making sure the whole world understands exactly how magnificent you are. Isn’t that right?”
Varra responded with, “Well, yeah. Isn’t that obvious?”
“In that case, I have a perfect solution. One that can spread your fame without killing a single person.”
Varra’s eyes went wide. “Really? That’s possible?”
“Of course it is!” Maxim exclaimed. “What do you take me for?”
There was a short pause before Varra hesitantly said, “Er… a hero?”
“No. Well, I mean, I am that, too,” Maxim said, his momentum faltering for a moment. Then it picked up again. “But what did you say I was, when you were up on the throne just now?”
“… A genius?” she asked, still not completely sure.
However, it seemed she had managed to get the right answer, as Maxim pointed at her and loudly announced, “Exactly! A genius! Therefore! Isn’t it obvious that a genius such as myself would have solutions to problems this trivial?”
“Oh!” Varra said, seemingly awed. “That’s amazing!”
“Yes. And together,” Maxim went on, sweeping an arm wide, “we shall spread your infamy across the whole of the world—without killing anyone! You will deceive all of civilisation itself! You will be both evil and devious!”
“OH!!” Varra exclaimed, looking amazed.
“But that’s not all,” Maxim said, lowering his voice, taking on a mysterious tone before he continued, “A reputation alone is never enough. Every dark sovereign also needs a heroic nemesis.” He paused and puffed himself up. “I shall take on that role. Together, we will be eternal rivals, destined to clash at the end of the age!”
“OHHH!!!” Varra clasped her hands together, eyes practically glowing. “I knew you were a genius!”
“Naturally. Only a genius of my calibre could be worthy to stand as rival to the Deathless Calamity herself.”
As the two of them spiralled off into whatever this was becoming, Orestis caught Aelia’s eye.
“We should never have brought those two to the same place,” she said, looking exactly how Orestis was feeling.
“No,” Orestis agreed. “We shouldn’t have.”
Eirene stepped up beside him and patted his shoulder with sympathy.
“I think,” she said, “I finally understand what you meant about Varra.”
Aelia looked down and apologised. “Sorry. She really was an accident…”
One we all have to live with.
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