"I'm sorry," I tell Silvia. "You're mistaking me for the myths. I can only cast the seven elements."

"Have you tried casting anything else?" She asks.

"No," I tell her. "But I can sense the seven elements in my Mana and nothing else."

Silvia stares at me silently for a few moments.

"You mean you can sense the seven orbs, yes?"

She knows about them? Does that mean she can sense them in me?

"What orbs?" I ask.

"You're good," Silvia chuckles. "I can't detect any trace of deception in your breath, heartbeat, or even in your microexpressions. You've done quite a lot of acting and making stuff up on the spot wherever it is you came from."

"It's a gift," I smile. "But yes, I'm an actor who's done a lot of improv."

"Improv?"

"Improvisation," I explain. "Where you come up with stuff on the spot. My friends and I put our hearts into it, too. We like entertaining kids at the parks during summer and nice days. Sera had an amulet, but you don't seem to. How did you know I was an [Archon]?"

"I have a blessing from the gods," she tells me. "One of its benefits is that it grants me [Appraisal] directly, rather than needing to use Mana through a magic item. I do only receive the same information that Sera does, however. So. The orbs."

"Yes," I say. "I can sense them. How did you know?"

"Because I can sense them as well," she touches her chest. "My own, that is."

"So you have orbs for the elements of light and shadow?"

"I have the orbs for all of the elements," Sera tells me. "Everyone does."

"But the rules of magic-"

"I did mention that the System changed the rules, yes?" She asks. "Or at least, it's arrival? Look inward, Reid, and sense your elemental orbs. Close your eyes and focus on them."

I close my eyes and do as she instructs, and after a few moments, Silvia asks me how they're arranged. It takes me a few moments, but I manage to find that though the orbs are everywhere within me at once, they're also arranged in a pattern.

"In a heptagon," I answer. "Lightning at the peak, then going clockwise, light, fire, air, water, earth, shadow."

"Good," Silvia says. "Now trace a line between them with your eyes, going in that order, over and over. Continue to focus on them and imagine this line appearing."

I do as instructed, and after the third lap around, I can sense a line between them. Not just one line, however, but several. Each orb is connected to every single other orb by a line, and the whole thing is bordered by a ring. A ring with runes contained within it. At the very center of the formation is another orb, this one shimmering and violet, and it feels… arcane. Not like any particular element, but as if it's magic itself.

The elements aren't flowing out of the elemental orbs and into my Mana… the elements are flowing from the outer orbs and into that central orb. That central orb seems to be the source of my Mana itself.

"You can sense it now, can't you?" Silvia asks. "Your mana core – and the Mana Gate itself."

"The Mana Gate?" I ask. "That's what this is called?"

"Yes," Silvia answers. "According to the ancients, and from what I've confirmed in my own research, everyone has the Mana Gate. We all have seals on our gates, however – seals that block elements from flowing into the mana core."

"And only the ones without the seals," I say. "Can flow into the core."

"Which is why we are limited in the magics we can do," Silvia tells me. "Before the System came, however, everyone could learn every type of magic. That didn't mean they were all powerful, as some people had more talent than others while some had abysmal talent, but it meant that everyone could learn anything, if they put in the effort and dedication."

"And the System put a stop to that," I open my eyes, losing the visual of my Mana Gate. "Because if everyone could harness all seven elements, everyone would be able to grow as powerful as we [Archon]s."

"Which could lead to the destruction of the world," Silvia nods. "I had a feeling you'd pick up on this quickly. Magic is your birthright, after all."

"Because I'm an [Archon]?" I ask.

"Check your Title's information," Silvia tells me. "It's become evident you haven't."

With everything that's happened so far, I didn't realize that I could check that. When I do, though, I see what Silvia meant.

Archon: You are an Archon, a being capable of wielding all elements without limitation. Magic is your flesh and blood, power is your birthright. As an Archon, everything is your right.

My Title says that everything is my right, and it may be referring to all types of magic.

"Seeing as," Silvia says. "People stopped being able to cast magics outside of the elements when the System came, and these seals appeared at the same time, we can assume that having all seven elemental cores active enables one to use other types of magic. Every [Archon] in our records has been able to as well, so it stands to reason that you can.

"As for you returning home," Silvia returns to the origin of this discussion. "The [Archon]s have always appeared suddenly, then disappeared. In nearly every case, the [Archon]s disappeared after the danger had passed. Almost immediately."

"Summoned, just like me," I say.

"Correct," she says. "Except in one case. I'm not sure if you were told otherwise, but [Archon]s have appeared roughly once every thousand years."

"I was told five hundred, I believe," I say. "And it's only been five hundred."

"The last pair of [Archon]s," she says. "Showed up five hundred years after the previous, and they were the anomaly. Every other [Archon] or group of them showed up during a time when there was a threat that could destroy the world – every other group except for that pair. They were simply here. Then two hundred years later, they vanished."

"The previous [Archon]s," I say. "Came to this world on their own, then left it on their own."

"Exactly," Silvia says. "Which means the power must be available to [Archon]s."

That brings us to the three choices I have. Seek the gods and ask them to send me home, but risk hearing that they can't due to whatever being brought me here. Deal with whatever world-ending threat is coming and then find myself sent back home. Learn how to open a passage between worlds on my own.

"Seeing as the summoning occurred near the start of a Slip," Silvia tells me. "This threat is no doubt because of the Slip. In other words, you'll likely be returned home in about two weeks from now if you fail to find a way back before then."

I grab the seat of the stool and lean back a little as I think. There's a possibility that Silvia is lying to me in order to get me to stay to help with the Slip, but also the possibility that she's correct. If she's trying to get me to stay to help out, then there's a possibility she'll attempt to keep me here after the Slip as well.

Some instinct deep within me tells me that the gods won't be able to send me home.

"Okay," I say. "I'll stay until the end of the Slip. If I don't end up back home after, however, I'll be going straight to the Shrine of Illusions and having a chat with the gods. That is, if I haven't figured out how to return on my own first."

"Thank you," Silvia says. "Do you want to do some magic practice before I take you and Terrence back? You may need some additional spells in your repertoire besides the handful you have now. You can also decrease the costs of your spells."

Training my spells would be a good idea, she's right. However…

"You've got something you want me to do," I say.

"A little," she nods, then pulls something out of one of the pockets on her robe, an envelope. "I was actually going to ask the guild to deliver this to the capital after checking on the town. It's a request to Terrence's father for Terrence to come out here. I might be powerful, but my magics are better-suited for monsters made of light or shadows. Not all monsters empowered by a Slip return down to normal levels.

"One of my concerns," Silvia sets the envelope down. "Is that some of the more powerful monsters in a tower a little southwest of here will remain stronger after. It's a group consisting of three Death Knights and a Death Mage – they're a form of undead. Undead with the intelligence and sapience levels of people. I'd already been planning on sending a request for Terrence's aid before the Slip, and this sped it up."

"It's an issue because of the Slip?" I ask. "How long has it been waiting?"

"I found the tower when I was exploring out here," she informs me. "It's about half a day's travel away by foot. They've kept to themselves for the most part, but with the Slip occurring, I fear they may try to move on the kingdom. They're certainly powerful enough to do so."

Now that there's an [Archon] here, she wants me to take care of them instead.

"Why can't you?" I ask.

"I have light magic," she says. "And you need holy magic or fire magic to deal with undead which have physical forms. I don't have fire magic, and my blessing from the gods doesn't grant me holy magic. I can break them apart, but unless I completely destroy their bodies, they'll simply pull back together. That's not too much of an issue against most skeletal warriors and mages, but against a Death Mage and three Death Knights? It's a suicide mission for me.

"This isn't me asking you to take them out on your own," Silvia tells me. "But me asking you to work with Terrence on it. If you agree, then I also ask that you do your best not to destroy the place – there may be valuable research materials there."

"Understood," I say. "Due to the Slip, I'm going to assume that Terrence and I will need to kill a few more things as well."

"You have around 500 Magic right now, yes?" Silvia asks.

"I do."

"There are some monsters which gave me quite a bit of Experience," she tells me. "Which net me three Levels for killing just five of them, and at a much higher Level than you. That suggests a rather decent base amount of Experience Points."

She's likely suggesting I kill them to gain Levels to boost me up for the tower with undead beasts in it. Completing both of these would definitely give me a power boost, which may help me with amassing the power needed to open a passage home, if it's possible.

"Which would be quite a lot at Level 24," I say. "Enough to give me more than a few more Levels. However, they'll be more powerful now, due to the Slip."

"Indeed," Silvia says. "And I don't mean I was at around 500 Magic, Reid. I was Level 42 when I battled them. These had around 300 Constitution before now. Judging by the changes in the monsters at this point in the Slip, they'll be two-thirds more powerful tomorrow, or at around 500 Constitution tomorrow. Considering that Slips also increase how much Experience a monster gives on top of making them more powerful, I'd be surprised if you didn't reach Level 40 just killing three or four of them. I'm going to recommend fighting them to Terrence, too."

"Okay," I say. "What are the beasts?"

"They're an elemental lizard," she answers. "They have an affinity for air magics, using [Air Bolt]s as their primary weapon, but they also coat their claws and teeth in swift-moving winds to tear apart things which come into contact with them. They aren't affected by it on their teeth, and they turn it off on their claws when not attacking. More powerful ones can use [Air Bomb], and some will use [Air Slash], which sends out a sort of bladed slash of compressed air to cut through what's ahead of them. A few will use it through their tail."

Silvia thinks for a few moments, then taps a spot on the map a little north of her cabin. It's a series of clearings with rocks and boulders, judging by the map's design.

"They're located here," she tells me. "A little more than ten hour's travel by foot. I'd recommend not flying in that direction. Living over here is a wyvern, and it likes to attack anything it sees flying by this whole zone here," Silvia draws a circle with a finger, the zone including not just the air lizards' domain but a huge chunk of land before and to the east and east of it. "I'm not powerful enough to handle it yet, so you definitely aren't. It's on my list of things to deal with once I reach Level 150."

"The wyvern's a threat to the kingdom, I presume?" I ask.

"Not yet," Silvia answers. "But this is the wyvern's nest, and if you look here… there are ruins right next to them."

There's no marking on the map to indicate the ruins.

"How accurate is this map?" I ask. "If you can't explore that area?"

"It's based on a fairly old map," Silvia admits. "But I've made all of the changes I've found to this one, it's my most recent version at the moment. The only reason I know about those ruins is because I've spotted them in the distance."

"Okay," I trace a finger from here to the ruins. "That doesn't seem that far away. There are ruins of another civilization that close to here?"

"Until the last Slip," Silvia tells me. "There was no town over here. Michael – Terrence's father – expanded our borders out to here once it ended. The nearby town is barely older than Terrence is."

"Still," I say. "That seems pretty close. I don't know how far the next town is, but it can't be more than a couple of days' travel, can it?"

"One moment," Silvia stands and starts looking for something.

When she returns, it's with another map, which she spreads out on the table. This one is much larger, and shows the entire civilized world and a bit of the Wilderness. The far eastern side of the region borders the ocean, though we're about two hundred miles from there. Three large kingdoms are marked out on it, along with about a dozen smaller ones.

"This is our kingdom," Silvia indicates the Elangetal Kingdom. "And we added not one but three towns in this direction after the last Slip. Here are all of the new towns that were made after it."

Silvia points out almost a dozen towns, all of them along the borders of the forest. There's a smaller forest between the nearby town and the next one over. Another new town is to the north of here, and there's a tower marked out not far away from that one. Judging by the markings, the towns are all around fifteen miles away from each other.

"They're spaced around half a day's travel by horseback," she tells me. "So we expanded around fifty miles in this direction after the last Slip. Michael was a bit absurd for expanding that far that fast, but it was actually beneficial to us in the end. We gained access to a lot of resources we wouldn't have had otherwise, decreased the population density in some of our most dense towns, and added in more areas for people to train safely. This forest between us and the next town over, for example, and these fields here. This lake is great for training water magics, as the monsters that spawn in and around it are still quite strong despite the forest around it having been cleared. In this spot, this spot, and this spot, more regular access to ruins became available.

"This tower here," Silvia indicates the tower I'd noticed, clearly enthusiastic about the ruins and expansion. "Was actually a long-standing issue for us. We knew about it, but didn't have the area around it cleared out properly. The tower had been sealed in ancient times by an unknown mechanism, and we'd been wanting to finally devote effort into unlocking it. They just succeeded last year, and it turned out to be an alchemist's workshop, complete with its own gardens inside of it."

Silvia continues to enthuse about the expansions, and she tells me a bit more. Apparently, it's only been the last couple of hundred years where the kingdoms were expanding outward. Until two hundred years ago, it was only a strip of land a hundred miles along the cost and fifty miles outward that was settled. She even pulls out another map to show me the old terrain.

Most of the ruins uncovered since the expansions were more than a hundred miles away from there. The capital of Elangetal Kingdom was built on top of one set of ruins, a series of tunnels deep underground. Claiming it is what led to the Windfangs gaining power, though they were one of several beastkin clans that settled in the area. Around a hundred years ago, they united together under the Windfang banner as a single kingdom.

So it's not that the ruins are close to civilization, it's that civilization has spent the last two centuries getting closer to the ruins. And uncovering more.

Silvia points out quite a few known ruins within two hundred miles of the current settled lands, including more than a dozen of which she's uncovered on her own. There aren't much known further out, as the monsters only grow stronger the further one goes. The route to the Shrine of Illusions is as 'easy' as it is only because there's some attempt at keeping the path reasonable.

Also because some sort of 'external' force (probably the gods) are keeping monsters at the same level of power around the Shrine of Illusions.

"I'm so sorry," Silvia stops after about an hour. "I tend to get enthusiastic. Do you have any questions?"

"Mind if I train here before going back?" I ask. "You can probably give me some tips on how to improve spells or for some new ones to learn."

"Not an issue," she says. "If you agree to help us out with these things, you can even stay here for the next few days. It would be easier than going back to town and then coming back to go to the air lizards' lair and the undead tower."

"Okay," I say. "Thanks. Second, are your boys using light magic to create that effect with their eyes? I know heterochromia exists, but for both boys to have it, and to have them matching like that?"

"That's natural," she tells me. "Sometimes, one's magic can have an effect on them – or on their children. This is more true when the children possess the same types of magic as their parents."

The same types?

"The twins are Tier IVs, aren't they?" I ask.

"They are," she nods. "So I wasn't too surprised when they were born and I saw their opposites. Whether they chose to because of it or they're simply inclined to, Sol prefers to use light magics and Shade prefers shadow magics. It's made it easy to lead people into believing those are their powers."

I'm going to assume Sol is the blond-haired boy while Shade is the black-haired boy.

"You're the same way," Silvia says. "You say there's no magic in your land, yet your own eyes are a sign of magical parentage."

"My own eyes?" I ask. "Terrence said that blue eyes aren't too uncommon."

"Blue?" Silvia raises an eyebrow. "Your eyes are violet, Reid."

"Violet?" I ask. "My eyes were most definitely blue."

"Interesting," she muses. "Let's ask Terrence."

We go outside and find Terrence and the twins wearing shorts, goofing around in the lake.

"Terrence!" I call out. "What color were my eyes when we met?"

"Blue," he answers as he throws Sol about fifteen feet, the smaller boy squealing before landing in the water. "They turned purple while we fought monsters. Figured it had to do with you being an [Archon] who was getting stronger in magic. That can cause changes in people, and purple's the color of magic itself. Meant to mention it, but then you were telling me about stuff on your world and I forgot."

"I suppose you're right, then," Silvia tells me. "It does happen sometimes that magical influence can alter things post-birth. You getting stronger could very well have caused your eyes to shift due to your affinity for magic itself. Your wind magics are already tinted violet, a sign of your Mana being that instead of the light green ours is."

So the coloration of wind magics is based on the color of our Mana? Is that a leakage, or just something that happens when using magics which are colorless by nature?

Now I need to figure out how to handle the change in eye color once I return to Earth. Will I be able to keep up an illusion at all times? If not, I might need colored contacts. Actually, contacts would be the more logical choice, there.

"Alright," I say. "I think I'm going to work on improving my spells some. Decreasing their costs will certainly help against the lizards."

"What lizards?" Terrence asks.

"Fun ones!" The twins respond before doing their best to dunk him.