Year 175

Back home, Lumoof and Edna had a meeting. They had questions, of course.

“Aeon, regarding that conversation with Aria...” They were concerned, of course. Strangely, not of the origins but whether I too, sought to return ‘home’. “Do you seek to return, the way it obsessively possessed Stella, and the previous heroes?”

A valid concern. “Yes. I admit that I have memories of another life. You may even consider me like her. But I firmly believe I am one of this world. Those memories are so faint these days, and I no longer believe there is a place there. My goal remains, to stop this foolish cycle.”

Lumoof breathed a sigh of relief. “The faithful would not take well to losing their god.”

Nah. I’m a semi-divine being here, and honestly I do quite enjoy this state of perpetually playing an RTS game. Why would I return to that old life? “No. But does it cheapen it, to know that your god has otherworldly origins?” I asked.

“No.” Lumoof said firmly. “All gods are otherworldly. I have looked into the histories of the other churches, and none of them ever set foot on our world. Only their avatars and their spokesmen.”

-

A year of preparation, as one of the rifts opened. With my new Astral vision, and Stella’s return, we could see that one of those tendrils that stretched out into the great beyond was far brighter than the others. In fact, when the rift itself opened, that tendril glowed in a light reddish color.

It’s as if that signified the pathway was used.

Then my magical sensors rang as they detected the rifts again in the Southern Continent. I quickly passed this information to everyone who mattered.

“Quickly! Get eyes on the ground and find out what kind of demons we are facing!”

It took about two weeks to locate the rift itself. At such distances my sensors are not accurate. The demons from the rift were typical hellhounds and horned demons with claws.

“Strangely typical. Nothing particularly different about this batch of demons?” It was too easy so we kept up the surveillance. I felt that the past few demon kings have been throwing curveballs, so something must be up.

At the same time, we also monitored the daemolite’s astral tendrils as the rifts activated. They didn’t seem to particularly change.

I therefore made a preliminary assessment, that the daemolite is nothing more than a ‘there’s a planet here’ kind of marker. Where the rift opens on our world is still in the control of the demons, I suppose they have a way of controlling it. It’s like here’s a ticket to earth, but you can still choose which airport to land?

Of course, could I interfere with the tendrils? If I cut off the tendrils, or find a way to confuse the tendrils, will the rifts be redirected or fail? It seems there are still things I cannot see, even though the rifts are clearly little magical tunnels through space and worlds.

So, now that Stella returned and I’ve also restored her body back to an optimal state, we discussed this idea.

“Interfering with the tendrils as they come to our world... I’m afraid I did not acquire that skill.” Stella said flatly. “My training focused on opening the doors to the other world with void mana, and do what the demons are doing.”

"So..."

"I know how to open portals, but closing other's portals... not so much."

Okay. What use is this information? As it is, if their homeworlds are filled with demon king level creatures, assaulting their homeworld with Stella's portal clearly is a suicide mission. I should only attempt this when demon kings are trivial opponents. But if I never get to that power level, closing down is my best option.

"But you can open portals, right?"

"Yes. Temporary ones, large enough for a few people, and no more. I still need to wait about half a year before doing it again."

"Alright, there is something I don't understand. You said you spent years on the other side. How does that work?"

"When a portal or rift is open, the time of both worlds are temporarily locked together, as if flowing at the same speed."

“And how big is your portal?”

“Uh... for a few people.” That wasn’t much.

“Can it fit Hytreerion?”

“Hytreerion? Who is that?”

“My walker.” Ah. I forgot that Stella may not know about my walker. “I will introduce you to it later. But first, what constraints do you have with your portals? Is it mana?”

“Yes. Void mana is one of the key constraints. I don’t have a lot.”

“But we have daemolite and those can store void mana. Let’s try it.”

“That means I have to recharge the void mana myself. For all of them!” That’ll take months!” Well yes. That is expected.

“There’s a lot we need to plan. We will first consider and test out a few with daemolite, whether it really augments your range. Next, if it succeeds, we will build larger formations with daemolite in order to allow your to channel more void mana, and for longer periods.”

“Normal runes don’t work with void mana.”

“Then we’ll find one that works. Point is, we’ll have to work with the restrictions we have.”

“Third, I want to attempt disruptive void mana injections into those tendrils. There’s some we can test now, and so we should test it as soon as possible.”

Stella rolled her eyes. “Oh lord I’m going to be busy.”

“Well, you went on a training arc, naturally we need you to show off your newfound powers.”

“All I did was go to different worlds and explore their powers...”

“Wait.”

How should we truly leverage Stella's ability to travel worlds? Am I thinking about this too... typically? I suppose anyone who had Stella’s portal ability would use it to escape from the demons, but from what I understand, the demons are also attacking the other worlds, and just like us, they have their own cycles. One world had it on a 15-year cycle, and another one also had a 10 year cycle. They too, summoned heroes to meet their foes.

Few things I clearly don’t understand is, if time moves relative across worlds, then why the cycles? Surely some worlds move ‘faster’ than others, and thus should have either significantly longer or shorter cycles?

Stella couldn’t answer this, it was a theoretical question that sought to understand the underlying mechanics. Her training arc focused on her individual levels and skills, and she’s a Level 75 Void Archmage with a smattering of portal-related skills. I also did not understand why the other worlds had the same rules as ours. That they have classes and levels too.

So, I summoned everyone for a big brainstorming session. How do we properly use portals to gain an advantage?

Edna was first to wonder, “Is there a way to take advantage of the time difference between worlds? Is the speed difference between worlds constant?”

Stella touched her hair and thought for a while. “No. It’s like a wave. Sometimes faster, sometimes slower. Each world moves and bobs on its own speed on the greater interplanar void. I’m not sure of the difference, but each world moves along its own uh... cycle.” I suppose its like how the distance between planets changes as they move across their own orbital planes?

“What sort of creatures are there?” Lumoof asked. “Do they struggle with the demon kings?”

“Their situation is not that different, they face demon kings and their gods summon heroes.”

“Their gods. Are the gods different?”

“I’m not sure. They are called differently, but they do have similar practices.” Are we dealing with a god that is present in multiple worlds, or is each god just locked to one world? No. In order to answer this question, I must first be able to not just sense divine presence, but discern who’s divine presence.

All the attempted divine forces I’ve seen so far did not differentiate who and what did it, so, it could be it’s just a single god at the back of it all, and all these other gods nothing more than shadow puppets. Or, if there are multiple gods, I want to know which one is friend, which one is a foe.

I’d have to ask the other spirits for ideas.

> Can you tell the difference between the gods? Each time you detected divine presence, can you tell who did it? <

Okay no.

I went to Aispeng and Aria next, and activated the new icemirror.

“Hi. Quick question, do you know how to tell the difference between the gods?” I felt like I was asking a colleague for some corporate work related thing. At least, the way I asked it. It just laughed.

“No.”

Huh. Do the gods hide themselves behind divine energy? Or is there a way to tell? Perhaps there in a unique signature in every use of their divine powers that can be linked back to them?

Anyway, that went through a path I wasn’t expecting, so I went back to Stella and the gang. “So, how else can we capitalise on our new portal?”

“I think it is an effective escape route. We can send some of us over each time, to avoid the damage of the demon king.”

At that point, I had to wonder. “Question. Can your portal transport heroes?” I wonder whether I could essentially pool the heroes of all the linked worlds together, and use their combined might to crush the demon king. It would significantly improve the survival rate of heroes, even if that does lead to the related problem of too many surviving heroes.

Stella paused. “I... I’m not sure. It’s loaded with void mana and unless there’s a way to package them so that their star mana doesn’t interact with the void mana that flows throughout the portal...”

Wait, if I could forcibly pull a hero into the portals, could I instantly kill them that way? At this point it was Kei who thought of the implications. “Can a hero be forced into a portal without their permission?”

“I don’t know.” I stored this possibility in the future. If I could create a small void portal, I may have a secret weapon against misbehaving heroes.

“How different are the magic and weapons of the other worlds?”

Stella thought about it for a moment. “It’s very similar from what I’ve seen, but I have not seen their higher tier magic or items.”

“We have lots of gaps in our knowledge.”

“Yeah... cause most of the time I’m with the zaratan, practicing my portal magic and learning the way of navigating the ever changing paths.” Stella sighed. “If you guys desire, I could arrange a trip.”

“But how would we come back? Stella’s our only chance to return and if we lose you, we’re done for.”

“...that’s true.”

“So, you must condense your knowledge and teach a few more. If we have a few more void mages, then we can safely make that trip to the other nearby worlds.”

Stella paused and quickly disclaimed that statement. “The concept of ‘nearby’ changes. Each world bobs along the great void ocean and the distance between worlds changes. So far only two worlds are reliably close by, perhaps drawn together by some unknown force, but there are worlds that get close, and then drift away. Uh... I think it’s a bit like the worlds have their own orbits, but these three worlds are like a stable-system, which is why the zaratans just mainly travel to these worlds.”

Kei frowned, she did not leave for the South yet. Instead she spent her time with Stella now that she returned. “That sounds like planetary movement.”

“Yes. That’s a close metaphor, but rather than circular orbits it might be fairer to say that certain worlds behave like comets with unstable orbits, while these three worlds have more stable, more ‘circularish’ orbits that never get too far from each other, even if the distance oscillates.”

“Ah.”

“So when a ‘portal’ opens, it’s as if both worlds are frozen?”

“Kind of. It’s some weird void-world thing. I can’t quite explain it either.”

“What’s the void world?”

“It’s the space between worlds? It’s really more like a massive, massive jungle where there are paths to each world and unless you know where to look, you are more likely to get lost. Which... leads us back to the demon’s tendrils... I believe they are kind of like trail markers, so that the demons can continue to find the world no matter where it moves along the void.” Stella speculated.

“If so, if we managed to get rid of the daemolite, can we pretty much hide the world from the demons?”

“Probably. Potentially. I’m not sure. The demons may have a different understanding of the void, that may result in a difference in how the void presents itself to them.”

“I don’t understand any of that.” The crowd of the senior Valthorns responded.

Stella paused and thought. “How do I say this... uh.. Erm... In a way, what you see in the void is shaped by what you believe it is.”

“That’s crazy.” Kei answered.

“It’s a bit like a projection. I don’t know how else to say it. The void’s this bundle of everything and nothing, the primordial soup really, so what you choose to see, you can see in it. So uh, it’s really quite a crazy, trippy place. Vallasira helped guide me to see the void as a big dark forest that connects the world, but the demons may see it differently. Everyone will see it differently.”

This was going too far. “Let’s come back to the issue of portals. We can test whether it’s possible to return using other means.”

“Huh?”

“If Lumoof is willing, he can be the guinea pig. I am interested to know whether my shared senses, and my recall ability, transcends worlds.”

I could sense the glimmers of understanding in those present, like it just clicked into place. Sure, maybe Stella can’t open another portal, or something happens to Stella, but if I could ‘recall’ them even from another world, then the risk is minimal.

Lumoof gulped uncomfortably. “Aeon, travelling worlds isn’t something I consider a priestly thing to do.”

“Unfortunately, I’d like to see the other world for myself, so, it has to be you. Think about all the new people you can convert to my cause!”

“Ah yes.”

“I’ll need some time to prepare. If we’re going to hold the portal for a long period of time, I need to charge up the daemolite as well.”

-

It took Stella two months to charge up a roomful of daemolite with void mana. Even then, I could see the tendrils pulse, and each pulse seemed to coincide with something. I wasn’t sure what, but perhaps its a sign that the ‘rift’ was transporting things?

“Alright. The world you are going to is called Varash.” Stella gave Lumoof a briefing of what could go wrong, and an overview of the other world. The area has been arranged to facilitate the interworld portal. He had an emergency kit, equipment and supplies enough to survive for months.

Stella prepped, and then opened the portal. From my perspective, using my spirit vision, it felt like a piece of paper was cut up, and pulled apart. Reality was being bent to open the portal. It wasn’t big, the size of a garage door. Perhaps a truck could drive through it, but Hytreerion wouldn’t fit. I would need to find more compact means of invading other worlds.

Lumoof gulped, and then stepped in. Stella’s portal did not require any specific mana regulation. It seemed that her ‘spell’ did it for her. Still, when Lumoof stepped through, she suddenly jerked and quickly drew on the stored void mana. At that time, I tried to share Lumoof’s senses, and was glad to find that I could still see. For a flicker of a moment, all Lumoof saw was bright flashing lights, similar to Star Trek’s warp, and then, stop.

Grass and a faint pinkish sky. Lumoof was in another world, and the portal flickered behind him. I felt my mind split suddenly. I could see through Lumoof, and home, but doing so drained on my mental resources. I could hear Patreeck’s voice in my mind. “Master, your mind activity is spiking incredibly.”

Trying to see through another world, and home was too much for my mental faculties. Not both at the same time. I temporarily surrendered vision of home, and handed control to Patreeck. I focused on Lumoof’s senses.

“I’m on the other side.” Lumoof said. It was a struggle, the worldly distance meant I felt like something was constantly hammering on my head. “This... this is another world.”

“Alright. Let’s test it out.” I switched back home, and that instant I was pulled back across the world. The mind-bending headache vanished. “Stella, close the portal.”

The portal closed, and then, I tried to reach out to Lumoof again. I could feel him, but I could not tell where he was. It’s like he was located off map.

“Hmmm. Alright. Lumoof, are you there.” I decided to not use the shared senses, and just tried mentally communicating with him across such distances. There was a time lag. A really long time lag. 30 minutes.

“I’m here.” Each message took 30 minutes, and I presumed that Lumoof was replying instantly. Even the system had a ‘speed limit’.

“Alright. Let’s test out. [Recall].”

At that very moment, I felt a mind-splitting headache again, and a good 30 minutes later, Lumoof popped out, and instantly started vomiting. He looked green and pale, and I felt like he took damage. I quickly hauled him to a biolab for healing.

Stella was truly impressed. “Alright, so interworld travelling works for your ability.”

Lumoof took two days to recover, and we had a post mortem.

“So we learned a few things. One, the system itself is a means of transportation across worlds.” That was my first conclusion. My ability clearly hitched on the system to pull them across worlds. “Second, is that my abilities work across worlds.”

“Doesn’t this just mean all the worlds obey the same system?” Kei wondered. “Then why is earth so... different?”

“We don’t know.” Stella sighed. “I asked the zaratans whether it’s possible for me to get home, and they said it is, but it’s going to be very hard. They don’t know of any hero or person that has ever returned, though a few have attempted it.”

The fact that all these other worlds obey the same system leads me to believe they are actually all in the same universe, but perhaps each of these worlds are just in their own astronomical ‘bubbles’. Whereas Earth may well be on an entirely different plane of existence. That means, all these demon worlds or other stuff, isn’t really a different dimension, but just different pockets of a universe that is structured very differently from ours.

Lumoof frowned. “That trip back was really nasty. I felt like I was being flung through the sky.”

“If we do send something or someone across, it should be a somewhat permanent arrangement.” Edna proposed. “More to collect resources or harvest certain types of materials?”

“But what’s useful there?”

“We’ll have to see.”

Stella quickly added. “Before we get there, I want to say that when Lumoof went over, it drained a lot more void mana than I expected. Significantly more, and I suspect it’s because he is either leaking more mana, or he’s just stronger overall. If not for the batteries of void mana, the portal would have collapsed.”

“So you’re saying if we send someone weaker, it’ll cost less?”

“I don’t know, but it certainly didn’t cost me anywhere near that amount of mana to send someone over.”

“Couldn’t it just be a not-me penalty? Some spells have a penalty when the subject is not themselves, that’s a common thing.” One of the senior mages opined. “We can easily test it out. Let’s send a mouse or some animal over.”

They tested it on a few smaller animals,then some larger ones, and Stella’s theory was quickly proven true. Sorry, animals. It did cost more to send stronger creatures, and it scaled with power. I wonder how this happens. A door is there, and why does it make a difference what walks through it?

More specifically, why did it scale with strength, not size?

Was there something in the great void that interacted with power? Or levels?

-

The envoys of Aiva returned with a message that more time was needed. For a bunch of gods, they sure are indecisive. Or maybe... it’s just time dilation from their perspective? That they are talking to their followers and they experience these huge ‘lags’?

-

The southern continent continued to face regular demons. More hellhounds, and typical giant winged demons with massive axes or swords. They also finally spotted a champion, which, boringly, was just a massive winged demon with two axes and a perpetual flameshield.

-

Stella started a void magic school, and we helped fund it, of course. A plot of land, slightly further away from Freshka than the other schools was allocated and they started building. There was a bit more interest now that Stella is an actual [void archmage]. Previously, everyone thought it was a path that led to death, so, a successful magician in a once disregarded path was awarded a reputation as a pioneer.

The motivations were simple. Many wanted to go to other worlds, and the idea appealed to some mages at a spiritual level. Like, to be one of those who could step to another world.

Void magic, and the practice of it, required a tremendous amount of healers on standby. That meant they naturally worked closely with Lumoof and the rest of the other Treeology priests. Every other day we have a case of the [void curse], and to my great pleasure, some of the priests had their classes changed to [cursebreaker].

As part of growing my understanding of the void magic, I also took the chance to look at Stella’s inner soul realm. Her soul spring was... a deep blackish liquid, that’s incredibly smooth and actually sparkles at some angles. It’s as if the night sky were made into a liquid. The pieces around her well or spring seemed to be made of a kind of black marble, it had glimmers of faint stars in them.

I thought back to my two new mini-gods. One immediate difference was that their soul spring was significantly larger than before. I would say easily five or six times larger, and they had a solid platform that surrounded their soul spring. I’ve not seen this platform ever, except in these two.

Black. The entirety of Stella’s mana pool was now void mana, and yet her body, physically, wasn't significantly different.

Stella explained it during one of her first classes with future void mages. Void mana needs to be ‘stabilised’. It’s a bit like a combustible ‘gas’ or ‘petrol’, it needs to be controlled, and stored correctly, and adapting the body to store void mana was one of the first tasks. In short, void mana had a ‘stable-state’, and an ‘unstable-state’. Some mythic beasts naturally have the means to process void mana and then store void mana, like the water-worldwalking zaratans.

Still... no particularly obvious solution jumps out. Void mana seemed particularly only used for the manipulation of the void. It feels like I found one of the keys that lead to the answer, and now I need to find the correct lock, among the thousands.