I was thinking long and hard about whether I should make a document such as this, something which would leave a trail for others to find, but in the end, I decided it would be worth it, assuming I prepared enough measures to ensure this document can’t outlive me unless I want it.

  — Excerpt from Notes For Newstar

  Day 463, 2:05 PM

  How does one help a person who stared at beings standing outside reality? From my shallow understanding, outer gods, as I called them, are vultures of reality or perhaps multiple realities. While I lacked specific knowledge, I knew one thing. It was the type of creature I was evolving towards as I increased my Anarchist class.

  “Your Imperial Majesty saw creatures standing outside the heavenly order?” I asked, and she considered my words before answering.

  “I don’t know what I saw. The old woman was definitely human or human-like. She had long nails, but they weren’t talons. Her skin was sickly and wrinkled and ruined, but definitely human.” The princess’s voice turned erratic.

  “Calm down, Your Imperial Majesty, you’re safe here.” I didn’t dare lay my hands on her. She might have me executed for touching her. “Such creatures cannot approach us. Otherwise, they’d be ruling the world, so please just breathe and try to relax.”

  It was no use. The princess had put up a brave front for moons or years or decades since her breakthrough, and all of her pent-up fear and panic spilled out like a flood river after days of heavy downpour.

  She babbled and cried, the dignity of her station forgotten. She was a terrified, half-mad woman who could ramble about the cosmic horrors she had seen in the lightning’s flash.

  They didn’t speak, and I’m not even sure they noticed her. In fact, they probably hadn’t, because her mind should have shattered from the weight of their attention. Fortunately or not, my experiences with outer gods besieging Everrain were indirect, so while I could sympathize, I couldn’t understand her plight.

  Like a wounded animal, I tried to soothe her with comforting words. And while humiliating on some level, the approach was the right one, for she was more beast than human with her inhibitions dropped and terrors of the subconscious haunting her.

  With my prodding, she gathered the shattered pieces of her mind and glued them back together, more and more realizing what she had allowed me to see, more and more considering whether she should have me disappear.

  “I am certain you saw something real, Your Imperial Majesty.” I played oblivious of her thoughts. “Something has tempered with your mind directly or through mere presence, and I agree with you that finding out what has happened and solving the problem should be your highest priority. I stand ready to help however I can.”

  I reminded her that I was the only one she dared share her secret with, and consequently the only one who could help with her problem. Something I had no intention of doing, as the moment her heart demon was gone, I would follow.

  “I need to meditate on this.” She dismissed me, still hesitant about what to do with me.

  I wasn’t sure, but even if I signed up for imperial service, healing her would still see me dead.

  So, with an uneasy heart, I walked back to my accommodations at the adventurers’ guild.

  The lesser worry was the consideration about what to do with myself. Whether to redo and get the hell out of the imperial family’s clutches, or to go with the flow and see where it takes me. I had managed over five moons without redoing, and unless something drastic happened, I intended to keep it that way.

  That was relatively easy to decide. The problem was the crone and the other creature. In my vision, there were three, none humanoid. One was of water, one of rock, which should be the one the princess had seen, and the final one was a squirming mass of tendrils or tentacles, mostly obscured by Newstar’s lava. None an old woman.

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  I recalled the vision, manabeasts and humans fighting against a much larger gathering of humans. For some reason, the imperials, along with the majority of orders and royals, fought alongside the cultists. Was the princess I was helping in some way corrupted? Would she become the next emperor, paving the way for the outer gods?

  It wasn’t impossible. If she kept advancing despite her heart demon, eventually, it would possess her, and if her heart demon originated from the outer gods, its nature would align with theirs to a point. Or at least to the nature the princess attributed to them.

  Such thoughts brought back the memories of Everrain and made me wonder.

  Why doesn’t this world have an available system interface for everyone to see? Is the golden crack their source of mana, or is mana a naturally occurring resource?

  Most importantly, was the human evolution through magic something granted by the outer gods or something native? Back on Everrain, a human-caused disaster had changed the ecosystem, leaving behind only bugs and humans. Did something similar happen here?

  The questions multiplied and jumped around like rabbits, but I had no answers save for guesswork, and guesswork around important topics could prove more dangerous than ignorance.

  None of that tells me what I should do next.

  On one hand, if I help her resolve her heart demons, she will have me assassinated; on the other, her heart demons will consume her, have me assassinated, and try to conquer the world.

  The choices really were shitty, but the latter gave me more time. If the princess were to end up possessed, it could take decades or centuries until she gave into the desperation and pushed forward.

  Besides, her heart demon wouldn’t consume her after a single evolution. Yes, a token of helping her combined with some good general advice on her life should keep me safe enough.

  Not like there’s a way to measure a soother’s effectiveness on their patient’s life until they cure them. And not all treatments bear fruit anyway.

  I decided I needed to read some more books on soothing. The imperial library certainly would have some new volumes for me, but without looping, perusing the books would cost me a moon or more.

  Why can’t I loop? If I only read books at the library, it won’t affect my mind, since I would do the same thing anyway. And it’s not like I’d do it for years. Ten-twenty loops should be manageable.

  I found myself climbing a slippery slope. A climb I needed to plot out with care before attempting it, lest I crash and lose everything. Again.

  Perhaps I should just do things the normal way, without resorting to premeditated suicide. I must have thought that two dozen times that day as I plotted out the scenario where everyone would allow me enough space for two weeks. For, unfortunately, Dandelion had become a household name amongst traumatized nobility, with increasingly important clients seeking my counsel as my track record grew more impressive with each passing week.

  First of all, my announcement would need to be public, in written form, about me trying to improve my methods by spending about twenty days in the imperial library, studying books on soothing and any tangent which could help with my patients’ burning problems.

  I did just that, completing seven such letters, before taking note of the exact time.

  All right. It’s showtime. I handed the letters to the guild’s official on duty, making the delivery run a second realm mission. Then, I was off to the imperial library, the building much larger than the branch at Thunderbluff.

  “How many books can I access for this?” I offered the librarian the potion Lord Helmsworth had given me when I let his son injure me.

  The man examined the potion, then used some sort of device until he finally nodded. “This could buy you fifteen eighth realm tomes, but we don’t have such treasures available for the general populace, the highest available realm being the seventh.”

  The librarian looked at me with envy. “As for how many seventh and lower realm tomes you can read, you can quickly do the numbers yourself.”

  I could and did, and it was more than enough to pay to read every book the library had to offer.

  “Thank you. In that case, I’m interested in what you have about soothing.”

  I checked the list of titles, most of which I had read, but I added the unfamiliar titles to my reading list, then continued with seventh realm tomes.

  There were blessedly few, barely enough to fill in a loop. With my head fuzzy from not sleeping for two weeks, I went out of the library and found a quiet place, where I detonated my realm and painlessly ended my life. Definitely an improvement compared to snapping my neck or braining myself. At least from the technical standpoint.

  The next two loops saw me reading the new information for the sixth realm, then four more for the fifth, until seven loops after beginning, I was done, the knowledge hoarded, and a fresh loop started to see what life had in store for me outside the safety of the imperial library.

  Despite how tired of living I had grown, I had to admit, I was afraid something unexpected would happen and someone like Lady Frostgrave might storm into my life. Because, at one point, I would have to leave the safety of the library.

  No use being a coward about it now, I thought to myself, then burned the freshly written letters to ash and scattered them.