Part 22 - Interlude - Faythe, the “Mountain Climber”

  Faith—yes, Faith, not Faythe, yet—was a somewhat fortunate child.

  On Pallos, nothing was certain when all things became malleable before the hands of immortal, high level classers. The pale hermit who often visited her farming village before she’d unlocked would always share tales of heroes and leaders with noble intentions.

  However, those blessed by the System with unfair powers and less than noble intentions had stripped her of her home and led her to wander the wilderness alone.

  By the kindness and grace of the Goddess Seira, a [Priest] had saved her from a life of misery, surviving only by the Kitsune natural affinity for the Mirage element.

  She’d found a home with the kindly [Priest]’s temple, and survived the loss of her village as an orphan in a major city shrouded by ash. Moving up from small farm girl to be a city orphan was somewhat of an improvement, in reality.

  The Shadow Monarch had created a nation founded on merits and had been seeking talents from all walks of life from any part of the new nation, large or small.

  The moment Faith had reached level thirty-two in her first class, she’d been granted a boon by the Goddess with her first major class choice of her life.

  She’d been offered a yellow class that had nearly made her heart stop.

  [History Student of the Progenitor]

  She hadn’t taken that class, but the big words like ‘Progenitor’ that she didn’t understand had seemed important.

  Instead, the stone on the jagged peak within her soul that she chose was the refracting hazy light of the deep blue option.

  [Order’s Oracle Shrouded in the Veil] - Mirage

  She had been chosen as the next [Oracle] of the Goddess. At just eight years old.

  The class wasn’t just something to make her the mouthpiece of the Goddess. No, Seira didn’t operate like that. The deific representation of the concept of Order was a master of the long, slow method of control.

  With the Goddess’ careful teaching and assistance, Faith wasn’t doomed to be a puppet of the temple for her lifetime. Instead, within a year, she held the information to manipulate and control the entire group of faithful with ease. Faith was a careful student, and with the blessing she’d been granted, she became the de facto ruler of an international religious organization.

  Then she’d seen him.

  The Shadow Monarch often wasn’t seen, but with her newfound position and the blessing [Perfect Visage] from the Goddess, she caught a glimpse of the man during an audience.

  The Shadow Monarch, a name used by the public, had the same face as the pale hermit who would visit her village all those months ago.

  She began to secretly research the first ruler of the newfound Exterreri Empire with all the skill and tact of an overconfident child, all to the satisfaction of Seira, her constant companion. It had gone well at first. Night, or sometimes known as Nyx, lived in an underground complex she’d yet to infiltrate, and had been forced to sever ties with so many spies over.

  The Shadow Monarch was a careful man, and his Sentinels and Rangers were legendary in their skill and efficiency. Just investigating the man had skyrocketed her level to almost three hundred by the time her tenth birthday had arrived.

  That birthday was the day he’d been waiting for her when she returned to her private quarters. The hiss of his voice had frozen her with terror, and Seira’s presence had vanished from her mind for the first time in nearly two years.

  [Warrior - 1,967]

  “You are a clever one. Very… competent and efficient. To never use your true face in public, and thus never feel the gaze of the masses directly upon you. After all, who would expect the [Oracle] of one of the major deities to be a mere child? You’ve learned a lot about me, and nosed around the details I left for you and your agents quite thoroughly. And despite falling for the ploy, your skills and decisions show that you will likely grow to have more value than even you realize.” The man spoke in a slow, dramatic fashion that ended with a long pause.

  Faith mulled over the words while she stood, paralyzed and unable to see a method of escape. Her second class was a [Thinker] class that sent alarm bells with every potential choice she made. He’d gotten her completely. Led her by the nose and entrapped her with the careful moves of a master at playing the game she’d only begun to play.

  “Your skills are quite interesting, as is your blessing. To begin with so much offered to you, and then choose the right class to make appropriate use of the gifts you receive displays excellent judgement. Rather than as enemies, I see an opportunity in you, if you could bring yourself to accept my guidance?”

  She felt her mind screech to a halt for a split second as she took in his words.

  He was offering her a place as his ally? The offer had so many implications. She’d slid into the role of a spy master since she’d taken up her post as [Oracle] and used her connections to weed out corruption within the temples of a half dozen countries, and she never had to take the ire, or be the target of the [Knife in the Dark]. With the guidance of a powerful, dangerous man like Night, the Shadow Ruler? She could become so much more.

  Best of all, she might survive the encounter with the man in the first place.

  Her voice felt hoarse as she contented herself with simply nodding.

  And that was how she’d become an apprentice to the immortal vampire progenitor.

  Vampires had a—for lack of a better term—bloody history on Pallos. Their first public appearance had led to hunting parties and murders of any overly pale-skinned person across the whole globe. Her first lessons had been to ‘adapt or die.’

  Then he’d imparted to her more of his wisdom.

  Grace, decorum, manners and foresight. She’d been taught the things many of his earlier failed progeny had lacked.

  She’d engrained in herself the skills to watch, ask questions and learn from everything she saw.

  Night’s favorite words were his three C’s. Control, Competency and Care.

  All of his words became a part of her being. A code she lived by in his image.

  That was why she was chosen to be the successor of the Shadow Ruler.

  At just thirteen, before the full onset of puberty, Faith had become Faythe. One letter becoming a hidden code symbol between her and her master. And as the second Emperor of Exterreri, she thrived. Night’s resources allowed her to collect and train farmboys into talented Sound classers as her new body-doubles, and she adapted her skills to remotely manipulate her [Perfect Visage] blessing as she built herself into a true [Shadow Monarch] who puppeteered Night’s nation.

  Stability wasn’t easy to create, but for someone who’d been personally trained by both Seira and Night, Faythe found it to be an exciting puzzle to solve.

  On her fourteenth birthday, Faythe was offered the immortal gift of her second mentor.

  She could live with being a child her entire life, as it was the greatest tool in her arsenal. Few would expect someone of her age to be the mastermind of political games felt around the whole world. At over level five hundred with a blue divine class and a black class from all her efforts, she was Night’s greatest student in many centuries, perhaps millennia.

  However, despite living among shadows for six years, she found she missed the sun’s rays. A quiet meadow in the sunlight with nature all around.

  Immortality wore on her as she slowly leveled and became the third Emperor of Exterreri, then the fourth as she neared her first hundred years of life.

  At last, it was time for her to find excitement again. She went to her second mentor with a new proposal.

  “Night.” She bowed her head reverentially, as her [Priestess] mother had taught her so many years beforehand. “I wish to try a new role in this fine play you’ve written. Would you listen to my proposal?”

  The old vampire only smiled, as if he’d known all along that she would tire of the constant political maneuvers of the nobility within the Empire.

  “Speak.”

  “There are now many candidates for your future leadership in Exterreri. I have watched as you create the building blocks of a Republic, even as simply another option. I would move forward with that choice. People tire of their monarchs, and I would expand my vision over the world to Mortal nations.” Faythe had become bored with the slow, decades-long plots of the immortal lands around them. Mortal countries rose and fell so quickly. In her absence as [Oracle] of Seira’s church, a mortal Theocracy had built power and sway amongst the nations of those lands. She wished to conquer those lands with the skills she’d learned over that century.

  “I see.” Night almost seemed somehow sullen at her choice.

  Had she made the wrong decision to leave him and cease to be his piece on the board? Or was he saddened at the loss of another disciple amongst his relentless war on time itself? Faythe may have had six hundred levels in her [Thinker] class, but those levels did not help her read Night’s unfathomable expressions.

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  She filled the brief silence.

  “I will continue to aid you from my new position of power. I will grow your influence in mortal lands and continue to function as your informant from afar. Anytime you need my services, I will provide them. You need only ask.”

  A low chuckle reached her ears. “I appreciate your offer. I will do so, if the need should ever arise. Please continue to keep me apprised of any issues that could require attention directly from myself or one of my Sentinels. You have been as gifted a student as your mother could have been, had she taken me up on my offers instead of choosing ascension. I will give you some maps of mortal lands with some potential hideaways marked.”

  Night rarely mentioned Faith’s mother, but it had always been rather obvious, given that he was the pale hermit of her childhood village. Faith had even been aware of her mother’s ascension during the destruction of their home. After all, she’d been notified that her mother’s name became the Goddess of Diligence.

  Faythe bowed again. Night had been her male teacher since she was a small child. If Seira had become the mother in her memory more than her biological one, then Night had become her father. Her heart ached, but she still went through with her decision. Night had lived for nearly eighteen thousand years. He would live for thousands more, and they would certainly see one another again.

  ~ ~ ~

  Faythe quickly crafted new suitable body-doubles for herself, and within the decade, she was the leader of her own [Tenet] faction within the theocratic Sovereign Justiciary.

  Technically, the faction leader was always meant to be her. As the core [Tenet] of her divine class, she was entitled to the position. The issue was proving such a thing without showing her identity in public. As a vampire and the proud [Veiled Monarch of Order], she had no choice but to play the long game, rig the rules and twist the proper arms to take control of the nation.

  Once again, as the [Oracle] she was entitled to leadership of the whole country. However, she had no interest in the role. Far better, in her eyes, to leave the existing leadership intact and manipulate the nation from the background.

  Conquering all the mortal lands in secret was Faythe’s life’s work. It took hundreds of years of uprooting power structures and rigging elections, but she finally was close. Sadly, it was all for nothing as immortal lands began to build up their arsenals for another great reset of the game board.

  Faythe could admit she was jaded about the inevitable ruination of her efforts, but she knew all too well that as soon as she completed her work, life would become boring again. A reset would do her good, and she could restart in a world born anew.

  However, that was when a major problem began to gather in the depths of the earth beneath the city of Mourningloft and several areas around the world, mostly around mortal lands. The occasional minor quakes spoke of an unusual threat she didn’t have information on.

  She immediately began to set her spies to their work.

  The only thing she knew of that was unusual beneath Mourningloft was the laboratory of a man who called himself a ‘Biologist’ who spoke a weird language she’d never encountered before. He would gather supplies or order strange things from [Artisans] in the city above before vanishing for months again.

  She had a shocking lack of information on the man, but his lab was part of her list of leads. She began to gather details, but the holes in the lists were frighteningly expansive. She had no details on what he ate, nor how he entered his lab. That led to a question of how he gathered air for the place with no entrances, but she had her own sealed secret hideaways and she grew plants in abundance to replace the air she breathed.

  She’d been gathering information on a wide range of high level classers who might be capable of causing earthquakes, but had no luck.

  It was infuriating to her, but she had no proper leads.

  “You seem perplexed, my wayward pupil.”

  She whirled around to find Night sitting in a chair made from vines, her third element having advanced to Forest over time.

  “I was wondering when you’d show up, Night.” She moved to hug her father-figure in a cold embrace. Then she opened the blood wine cabinet and grew a pair of wooden goblets for them to drink from.

  The issue was certainly something Night would show up to ask her for some added information about.

  “I have three suspects for responsibility.”

  “You have not heard from the goddess for a direct answer?”

  Faythe’s face fell at the mention of the goddess.

  Seira had begun to turn her gaze elsewhere, seeking out a new [Oracle] and it had caused the goddess’ voice to fade somewhat.

  “She has started her search for a new toy to interest herself with, then?” Night reached out to comfortingly pat her shoulder. Faythe had long known that Seira was kind and had truly treated her like a daughter, but the goddess was not wholly benevolent. At times, the goddess would directly manipulate her followers by giving them what they wanted. For Faythe, it had been a mother figure after she’d been abandoned as a child.

  “She has not given me an answer to the question.”

  “I have asked some other connections to inquire with the gods. All have come back with one answer. Otherworlder. I have taken a long look at the records of my own history and pondered the various instances of intruders from other worlds over millennia. Some of these instances have centered around people with vast knowledge that has propelled Pallos forward by many eras of knowledge and experimentation.” A long pause, one of Night’s customary ones, stretched long enough for Faythe to consider it before he continued.

  “The largest influence from one of these ‘Otherworlders’ was one of my very own Sentinels, in an age long past. She was the original creator of the Medical Manuscripts. I have made all knowledge available to me for this investigation. If you would allow me to look over your notes, I will try to identify some clues that match.” Faythe readily directed Night to her massive wall of pinned-up clues.

  After some time, Night frowned.

  “Why have you ruled this one out?”

  Faythe looked at the crossed out name and then at the notes below.

  “Henry White, that biologist nutcase. Odd name, but his elements were confirmed to not be possibilities. The magnitude of the effects would require boosting skills and a focus on Earth or Mountain, maybe Lava or something similar. An Ooze and Sand user wouldn’t be likely to cause these tiny tremors across such a broad area.”

  “Perhaps it was remiss of me to train you to hide yourself away. You don’t conduct investigations in person at all anymore. I must surmise you’ve not felt one of these tremors for yourself, meaning you are as yet unaware.” A short pause this time to reflect upon her mistake, then he continued.

  “These tremors are not only of the earth. The waves impact and distort the air as well. It would imply the elements of Void, Sound, Spatial or perhaps Steam deep below the surface.”

  Faythe nodded, but still had a frown on her face.

  He gave her a look as she continued to turn it over in her head, slightly slow to catch up as she considered his words but still found the man in question to have no ties to the newly listed elements.

  “Ah.” It finally clicked. “But isn’t he too low level to be triggering such reactions with mandalas? The efficiency of that method is too poor for this outcome.”

  She was right, and she knew it. Methods of casting spells that could expand beyond your System-granted abilities ate an efficiency penalty that made the broad ability level more reasonable as a tradeoff. Mandalas were runes created using skills to enact effects not restricted to the caster’s element. A person able to trace mandalas with Radiance could perform feats restricted to Mirage users, like invisibility skills. However, unlike Faythe’s ability to make herself invisible with a skill, the mana cost of the mandala would be prohibitive for normal civilians at their lower levels.

  “Even if the man had a way to use a mandala to create a sound spell that would cause tremors in various parts of the world, it would cost too much.” Her conclusion led Night to give her a small smile.

  “You do not have the understanding that comes from direct experience to know what these ‘Otherworlders’ are capable of. The author of the Medical Manuscripts was able to craft a restriction skill that enabled her to use her advanced knowledge to heal herself even through decapitation while at a relatively low level. With the correct restriction skill to grant the stats, a driven individual can accomplish many things, as I taught you. However, with knowledge beyond our understanding, many things become more possible.”

  Faythe drank in Night’s long explanation and nodded quickly.

  “If you would lend me some of your talented associates, I would very much like to share some words with our ‘Otherworlder’ friend.”

  A long investigation after the events had ensued, but in the end, they’d failed to kill the man they’d been tracking even as the tremors got so bad that nations began slaughtering their Spatial casters to prevent them.

  In the process, Night had been let down by one of her recommended [Paladins], resulting in his being lost through the portal the man had made.

  Faythe knew better, but with Seira no longer watching her so closely, losing Night hit her especially hard and she had blamed herself. She migrated to a new bunker and settled there, promising Night’s wife that she would keep constant vigil on the area.

  She had a plan for the immortal war fast approaching. The Justiciary would need to fall to increase the odds of her own survival, reducing the value of the area as both a source of experience for others and a source of money and resources.

  She would instigate a conflict to bleed the land dry, reduce the population and plunder the nation’s wealth. The portal Night had disappeared into and the bunker she hid herself within would remain untouched by the ensuing chaos.

  She took a decade to nearly complete her controlled demolition of the nation she’d built as the base of her power.

  That was when Seira had left her completely.

  The goddess had found her new toy, and a new [Tenet] became illuminated on the monument of Mourningloft Cathedral.

  It wasn’t hard for the [Veiled Monarch] to find Seira’s new [Oracle].

  Liz, a young woman who suddenly appeared in Heron Lake, a tiny village she’d used as a disposal site for some of those involved in Night’s disappearance. Petty vengeance, but it had worked out.

  Arlyen was all-too quick to jump to a new mission during the preparations to remove the ‘corrupt roots’ of the Justiciary and go play teacher to get her reputation back. In the end, her playing as a Valkyrie was just a flight of fancy.

  Arlyen would be perfect for containing this new ‘Otherworlder’ and in time, Faythe would make a powerful new pawn from the naive girl. Any useful knowledge would eventually be well contained by her guiding hands before it could cause more troublesome issues.

  Faythe had grown some reservations about Liz.

  Her knowledge wasn't terribly harmful, unlike the biologist’s ‘wormhole theory’ he used to get home. Gemstones were a source of wealth, and rarely a source of lasting power. The research of the subject was useless to her, since she had more time and wealth at her fingertips than she’d ever find a use for.

  In the end, a pawn was all she would be, regardless of how much Seira doted on her new champion.

  Faythe sent the girl on a mission, and eventually, the girl would become powerful in her own way. The most dangerous people in the world were controllers. Competent and careful control of others led to grand results. Liz was unique, but so very broken. Her emotions ran wild and pushed her every decision to ever increasing trauma and emotional outburst.

  As if the girl’s vain attempts to act composed would hide her fraying mental state from someone like Faythe.

  Liz would choose the path of personal brutish power, and she would aim for ascension just as Faythe’s own mother had. In the end, the girl would end up used every day of her mortal life.

  Faythe’s musing was interrupted as a commotion reached the eyes of Jayce, her body-double in the main compound of the bunker she’d redesigned.

  One of the members of Team Gamma stumbled into her office and coughed out blood, clutching his stomach to keep his organs inside as he struggled to report.

  “C-...” he spluttered over more blood.

  “Yes?” Jayce stood and strode over to the man.

  “Change…” more blood was splattered onto the floor.

  “Report, even if it is your last act.” Jayce commanded without her sending any instructions. This incarnation of her body doubles was competent on his own, even if he had an completely emotionless expression.

  “Changeling!” The wounded man gasped his last breath as he released all the tension in his body, having completed his task.

  Faythe cursed the Fae in her mind repeatedly, but she was too smart to verbally do so.

  “How did one ever get inside the facility without being detected at the entrance examinations?”

  She prepared herself to have to manage a complete mess.