After the initial surprise wore off, I sat there for a moment wondering whether I had trapped myself. My magical awareness spread throughout the confines of the tesseract. It extended no more than an arm’s reach in either direction. I hunched my shoulders against the suffocating closeness of the invisible walls.

In retrospect, activating the sword had been foolish. I had expected nothing more than an amplification of power, hopefully something that I could draw into my own reserves to replenish them. While it defied all known laws of the universe to create energy from nothing, the idea had not seemed impossible. As I had discovered while fighting Champion Jokul, some intrinsic part of the sword was already capable of magnifying my power.

What if the sword had created a tesseract smaller than my body, with me in the center? Or if it threw me a decade into the past? While the latter could have been interesting, playing with mysterious artifacts seemed to have a concerning amount of options when it came to ruining my life.

I warded off panic by reminding myself I had already unraveled a tesseract once. The memory did not help much. My reserves of time magic were exhausted after channeling the final dregs into Dasein. My void magic was not much better. The others must have noticed something. If they attempted to enter the tesseract, there was not enough room for two people. What would happen if they only put in a hand? Would they be able to remove it, or would their arm be trapped?

I hoped I didn’t have to find out.

‘The network of interlocking silver that made up the barrier shone in my mind’s eye, identical to the one from Amelie in Yellow. Despite the usefulness of such a pocket universe, this discovery made me suspicious. If Dasein was my sword, like Paimon had claimed, why did it have the capability of creating a tesseract in the first place?

My investigations had revealed little information about time magic or artifacts outside of speculations about their existence. Perhaps Astaroth had altered the sword, aligning in a certain configuration to allow it to create a tesseract. The depths of a high-ranking Goetia’s power was unfathomable to me. The demon lord specialized in arcane formulae; such a thing would not be beyond him.

I focused my awareness on the sword once more, delving into it. The brilliant light filling the blade washed over me, wiping out all thought for a moment. When I recovered I directed my willpower toward the energy. Nothing. I formed an idea of what I wanted to do: reverse the flow of light back through the sword. While logically it may not have worked, the Mental Realm was more of an approximation of my thoughts. The intent, filtered through visualization, was all that mattered.

And it worked. As the light flowed backward through the sword’s amplification network, it dimmed as quickly as it had flared. In seconds it was nothing more than a silver thread. I reversed one step further until it returned to its previous state as a small marble hovering in my mind’s eye.

The tesseract collapsed all at once. On the other side, the others stared in shock. Caedius’ mouth hung open, his squinted eyes giving him a brutish appearance. Felix rested a hand against his chin and grinned at me. Zephyr, of course, had drawn her sword.

"What's the meaning of this?" she said.

I stood up and sheathed Dasein. "You don't have to pull your blade out every time something happens."

Felix coughed a couple times into his hand. I shot him an unamused glance.

"Alright," said the Narahven. "Let's talk. You just disappear in front of us and reappear. Would you like to explain?"

Was there any point hiding the truth from her? I considered it for a moment. She took a threatening step forward. I sighed. While I had no intention of befriending her, and would be happy to abandon her at the soonest opportunity, I saw no point in fabricating some transparent lie.

"I told you before," I said, "the sword created the tesseract around Amelie in Yellow. I found a way to reactivate the ability."

"How did you manage that?"

I did not like her tone, as if she was interrogating a prisoner. "I know how to project my consciousness around me. When I looked into the sword, that's what happened. If I knew it could do that, I would not have done it right in front of you."

That one seemed believable enough. She accepted it with a small nod and sheathed her sword. "Forgive me for not exactly trusting you. Your close involvement in this is beyond suspicious. And you did stab me in the shoulder."

She rolled the injured limb in its socket to demonstrate how little she thought of the wound.

"Would you have preferred the heart?" I said.

She shook her head and changed the subject. "Are you able to locate the source of the tesseract around the city? You said that one of the Goetia means to descend. Our best option is to drop this barrier and expose the city to the outside world. While Vasely may have his hands full by himself, there's a reason demons don't invade this deep into our territory. Archon Nony could be here in minutes if he learned what was happening. Winter wouldn't be too far behind."

The moon hung pregnant overhead as the final touches of the dusky faded away. Night settled over the world.

How much time did we have? Without my powers, I would be useless. Even with them, how much could I truly change?

"I need to recover," I said. "This sword can help give me some more time as long as I have somewhere safe to meditate. As of now, I'm too exhausted to do much."

Another lie, since my awareness required no source of power beyond my focus. Either none of the others could do the same, or they figured that our abilities functioned differently. No doubt they were happy enough to rest themselves.

Caedius remained silent, staring at the ground in front of him.

"We can go to my safehouse," said Felix. "Not too far from here, and there are rations depending on how long you stay in there. Do you think you could bring some of us in there?"

Zephyr bit her lip. "I don't like this. If you do anything to cross me, I won't hesitate. You have one day before I bring you all back in chains. And this better not be a delaying tactic."

"Then let's hope we have a day," I said.

Felix nodded at me and started walking down the avenue. I followed him, with Zephyr looming behind me and Caedius trailing at the very back. While I wanted to speak with my friend, the West Wind may very well have inherited Vasely's hearing. She had been able to track me even without me using my magic. Not to mention what other minds may have taken an interest in us. Sometimes when I looked at the other disciples, I imagined Astaroth was watching everything through their eyes.

Only as a last resort, I decided.

We left the avenue of manors, heading deeper into the city, in the direction of the Gardens. Brother Augur would be waiting for us. Caedius wanted to reunite with Mara but I saw no reason to follow him there. I was loathe to return, though it may be necessary in the end. Paimon expected me to somehow stop or kill Brother Augur. Our paths would have to cross again, though I could not imagine how to defeat him.

Few people roamed the streets besides us. Those who did regarded us with suspicious eyes and kept their distance.

On occasion a boom would reverberate throughout the city with enough power to make the ground tremble. It seemed as if they were becoming louder and closer.

"Is the Archon really not able to handle some demons?" said Felix.

Zephyr bared her teeth at him. "You would die within seconds out there. Wind and sound magic are versatile but there are only so many ways to kill with it. You can't end a General through blunt force, even if you drop a building on it. They have no need to breathe, so asphyxiation is useless. At most he can tear them into pieces from conflicting pressures, but even that may not be enough."

We hurried along at a steady pace for the next three minutes and sixteen seconds. I considered my options while trying to keep my attention on our surroundings.

What were the limits of the swords' ability? It should be naturally attuned to me. Perhaps I could find ways to adjust it. What if I could make layers of tesseracts, until time passed at an incredibly dilated rate? The fact the sword was able to make one despite already being in a field of dilated time proved it was not an impossible idea. Already I found myself forgetting my earlier reticence to experiment with a mysterious artifact.

Zephyr held up a hand to stop us and sniffed a few times. "One of the spiders is nearby. Most of the demons are focused around the fighting. We're heading in that direction so we'll start coming across them. Best to avoid them for now unless necessary. I've already killed several but they're replaced just as soon as I do. Stay focused and keep moving."

We continued along, stopping a few times to head down alternate streets to avoid demons. Finally we came to Felix's safehouse, a windowless building in one of the worker slums. We passed the most people in this area, mostly hopeless folk that wandered around without paying attention to anything around them. One elderly lady wandered down a street, shouting for a woman named Pola in her sad, feeble voice.

The exterior did not prepare me for what lay inside. Once Felix opened the door, I felt as if I had stepped into some opulent palace. In contrast to the drab stone outside, the sheer opulence made me want to laugh. Everything was an ostentatious white and gold, from the rugs to the scattered chairs in the sitting area. A table in the center boasted several large decanters of wine. The mural on the wall made me grimace---Lyra's work, I guessed. A giant ouroboros, stark white against the golden walls, reminiscent of her tattoo.

"It's not much, but this is my hideaway," said Felix.

I found my voice. "You should see mine. Makes this look like a hovel."

"Well, I have some water and rations, at least. If anything happens, how can we get your attention?"

Damn, that was a good question.

After a few moments, I responded, "I'll try to drop the tesseract every once in a while and we can communicate anything we think is relevant. Maybe I can figure out how to expand it to include you. Maybe it's just best to keep it simple, though."

Felix walked over to the table and poured himself a glass of wine. "I have no interest being trapped in yet another tesseract. This is already deep enough for me. I have good wine and great company. Don't you worry about me."

Despite the expensive furniture and my friend offering me a massive cushion to sit on, I preferred sitting on the ground in the lotus position. Dasein lay across my lap.

I focused on the drop of time magic in my mind's eye. Now that I had experienced activating the sword twice before, forcing the silver light into the sword felt as natural as breathing. My consciousness delved in afterwards, following the thread along its journey. I made no attempt to guide its course. Once the silver light filled the blade, I felt the tesseract materialize around me.

The familiar network glowed around me. Though I was curious how to even begin altering the tesseract to my specifications, I restrained myself. My goal was to refill my reserves of time magic enough to at least reverse up to an hour. While it was not optimal, it would be better than complete helplessness.

I emptied my mind, choosing not to consciously focus on anything. Though there was much for me to think about, I had discovered when I entered the perfect trance, ideas would sprout from nowhere. The mystery of the sword worried at me. Its contradictory nature. Why had it been the keystone of the tesseract I happened to walk in to? Could that have truly been a coincidence? How would it benefit to return my sword to me, especially if it was such a useful artifact?

The first hour passed before I knew it, and I was none the better for it. My magical reserves had replenished slightly. Not enough to get excited about, and no faster than my natural rate, but it was progress.

I dropped the tesseract, though I had nothing to report to the others. Caedius had apparently gone to sleep, or at the very least wanted to be alone. Felix slumped in a chair, glass of wine dangling from one hand; at least he was not smoking his usual opium. Zephyr sat in another chair, her posture perfect, hands folded primly across her lap.

"How long has it been out here?" I said.

"Around ten minutes," said Felix. "Find out anything new?"

I shook my head.

The Narahven brushed her hair from her face. "What are you doing in there? Have you found the source of the tesseract?"

Annoyance crept into my tone. "No. I'm trying to figure out the connection between the sword and the creation of the tesseract. If I do that, it should be easier to figure out what is powering the barrier around the city."

She chose not to respond.

I reconstructed the tesseract, once more resisting the urge to play with the sword's powers. After a few calming breaths I returned to my trance state. This time, instead of letting time pass, I brushed my consciousness against the surrounding barrier. What was the tesseract exactly? A four-dimensional construction of time, I knew. But that could not be the full extent of it. Could one create a physical manifestation of such an abstract concept? It could be possible, the same way that if one understood the concept of fire as light and heat, they would not necessarily know what it looks like without having seen one.

Time, for its part, was change. It needed to act upon something. So the tesseract somehow latched onto the underlying Physical Realm. How? I let my mind wander once more, seeking the ever elusive concept of what exactly my magic represented.

And so passed another three hours and fifty minutes, where I felt no wiser for it, but my magical reserves continued to prosper. The time magic may have replenished a fraction quicker than its void counterpart, though I was not exactly sure.

This time, when I dropped the tesseract, Zephyr was still in her chair, watching Felix as he moved through his bladeforms.

When I returned to my meditation again, I allowed my mind to drift to memories of the past. Particularly conversations with Brother Augur and Paimon. Though I tried to remember them as exact as possible, I had once read that our memories become corrupted the more we consider them. Our minds no longer refer to the original moment it occured; we remember the last time we remembered it.

Paimon seemed to think that I would understand his cryptic explanations if I took the time to consider everything. What was I missing? Then I began to wonder about Augur's space magic. Was space a concept like time? It seemed to be the opposite: true, physical existence. Reality itself. Everything around us.

Memories surged through my mind. One in particular caught my attention. When Augur discovered Caedius and was enraged Astaroth had turned the 'betrayer' into an Echo. Why did he care? At first he had presented himself as opposing the invasion, but his space magic originated from one of the progenitors of all demons. And he had known what Astaroth was planning all long.

I could not imagine what Augur's intentions were. I did know that he could manipulate space. And if time needed to latch onto something to manifest, space would have to be that foundation. I had never been able to sense his magic. I still couldn't, I realized, even though it formed half of the barrier around me.

That was it, then. The tesseract was a space-time construct. After this revelation I thought I could sense the fringes of something, a nebulous blue energy interspersed within the network of silver threads. Perhaps I could alter the dilation of time within the tesseract, but I doubted I could do much to its physical form without the ability to manipulate space.

The tesseract around me disappeared.

Surprised, I leapt to my feet. Consulting my internal clock revealed I had spent seven hours and twenty minutes in that last meditation phase. Too much time; I had let my mind wander for far too long.

Felix and Zephyr were nowhere to be found. No one responded to my shouts. Heart pounding in my chest, gripping Dasein until it hurt, I searched through the building for Caedius, discovering nothing.

I returned to the main room, facing the door. Beyond, I sensed a raging whirlpool of energy---time and hints of blue. I did not need to find the source of the tesseract; it had found me.

Had the time come already? I should have returned more frequently even if it interrupted my meditation. At least my reserves of time magic had filled enough that I could reverse time a touch over thirteen minutes. Better than nothing.

I opened the front door and stepped out into Brother Augur's arboretum.

The sight froze me in place. The gentle river burbling away. Snowflakes falling amongst the trees. Brother Augur stood in front of his hut, hands clasped behind his back. The whirlpool of time and space magic spun about him, centered around his being. I looked behind me and saw the entire safehouse had been teleported into the clearing. Impossible.

"Leones," called out Brother Augur. "It appears I owe you an apology. This entire experiment has proven to be a useless endeavor, though it has been rather informative. I could feel you prying into the anima, attempting to discover the truth. Unfortunately, you have been an utter failure so far. It is far too late at this point. No matter how many advantages I give you, no matter how many times I save you, you are not able to progress well enough. You simply refuse to do what must be done. It may very well be time to abandon this idea."

"What?" My hands trembled. "What are you saying?"

"All of these sacrifices have not been in vain. Next time may bring me even closer to achieving my goal. Do not fret. I am not so heartless as to allow Astaroth to rampage throughout this world unimpeded. First, you must return Dasein to me."