Dear Spellbook,

It's a bit nostalgic to be writing an entry back in my room in the Parlor. I’ve been pretty spent every night these last few months, but I’m about to go back to the Dahn. It might be a little hectic once I do, so I think I’ll catch you up.

Riloth 19th the 1146th

I had reached the limit of how much I could improve my mental defenses without undergoing another mental assault. Though it was tempting to stay in the Dahn working on my other magics while not being mentally ravaged, that would be selfish. Collectively, we had decided that I would leave the Dahn and find someone to test my mental abilities against.

We had debated long about the risks of reconnecting to the Material Realm. We risked the aboleth reinforcing her control over Dagmar, but I’d witnessed personally that mental attacks take time, so if we kept the contact short, she may not even notice the sudden appearance of Dagmar’s mind. Just in case we were wrong, we chose to open the door just before the reset.

So, at the appointed time, I stood at the door to nowhere. Shortly before the end of the reset, Daulf recounted the door to the Material Realm, I Blinked out, and he sealed the entrance again. A few seconds later, I woke up miserable in my bed.

Riloth 19th the 1147th

“I didn’t miss this,” I mumbled to myself as I got my bearings.

I Conjured you to my hand and flipped to the message page to see what happened during my sleep.

Dagmar was asleep when we opened the door. When asked in the morning if she felt the aboleth’s connection, she denied there ever being one. We cannot tell if the opening had any effect.

Confirm receipt of this message.

Thankfully, the twinning worked even with the Dahn cut off from the Material Realm, something that hadn’t been certain. I wrote back:

Message received. Don’t kill yourself messing with runes, think of all the knowledge you’ll lose if we need to grab a new you.

Levar was very interested in joining the Hardune and had pestered Dagmar endlessly for any way he could somehow swear the oath. He had some small desire to protect the Material Realm and all that noble stuff, but his main motivation was the quasi-immortality the two of us were currently experiencing. He had many rare alchemical concoctions he wanted to try, but failure to do them properly had disastrous results. Sometimes the mixtures exploded, other times they melted the flesh off of the imbiber.

After acquiring my potions and a very late breakfast from the market, I went to revisit an old acquaintance. Our last encounter had been less than pleasant, but thankfully she wouldn’t remember.

In the shadow of a stone minotaur, I knocked on Ren’s door. On seeing the minotaur, some of Ren’s claims from our first meeting floated to the surface of my memory.

Didn’t she say that was the Gorgan’s minotaur? And why hadn’t those assassins I killed turn to stone? Maybe she will know.

Ren opened the door, interrupting my musings.

"Can I help you?" she asked after I didn't sat anything in the way of introduction.

"I'm sorry, I'm a bit distracted," I said recovering, "Your minotaur reminded me of a run in I had with some of the gorgon's assassins."

The bored look she wore disappeared, now quite interested in what I had to say.

This is new.

"Please, come in," she said, opening the door wide. "Let's swap tales."

I followed her inside, and she went behind the bar to mix up the same extremely alcoholic drink she had given me each time she beat me too badly in our sessions.

Have I finally earned a little respect in her eyes?

As she shook the drinks, chilling them with her magic as she did so, she asked me to tell her about my run-in with the assassins.

I shared with her the details. How I used a Mind Spike and the assassins reverted to their uncontrolled selves, and gow in the process one fell to their death.

"Why do you think they didn't turn to stone at their death?" I asked once done with my recounting. "I take it the minotaur did so when you slew it."

"The minotaur was the last of the snake bitch's original menagerie of death," she explained.

She paused to stare at my drink, which I'd yet to taste.

Sighing inwardly, I took a sip.

This actually isn't too bad. I think Dagmar is corrupting me.

Satisfied, she continued, "Before the Flood she had a hall of trained killers frozen in stone. With each job, she'd free them, and upon completion reward them with a month of pleasure. Not a bad gig honestly. After the Flood, she failed to recruit replacements and partnered with some freaky tree demon to mind control her newly acquired less-than-willing assassins."

"So why did this new breed not turn to stone?" I asked.

"Fauell if I know. I'm just saying that the one I killed was way more impressive. No way a simple Mind Spike would have done Flood to old One Horn out there."

I looked at the minotaur out the window and saw that it clearly had both horns. Ren followed my eyes and smiled.

With a shrug, she said, "Tilavo requested that I have a stone loincloth added to the statue shortly after I moved here. Prude."

I made a mental note to talk to Levar about this—the turning to stone thing, not the stone member.

“So,” she continued, “Why are you here? You said my statue jogged your memory, but I take it you came here for another purpose.”

“Oh yea,” I said, remembering my real intention for the visit. “I am looking to practice my mental defenses, and I was hoping you would have some Mind magics that you could employ to identify cracks in my vault.”

She looked me over once more, reassessing me in light of my request.

“You are an interesting one,” she said quietly, possibly to herself. “I think I can help with that.”

“Great! How should we—” I began but stopped at the sensation of her using her Blessing to access the Arcane Realm.

At the feeling, I sent my mind into my vault in preparation for an attack, chiding myself for not seeing this coming.

I entered just in time to see the wall blow open as the cracks in my mind blew open, the light of a brilliant red and gold sunset piercing through the cracks and attacking my inner self. The spell overwhelmed my pitiful attempts to defend and threw my awareness out of my vault.

“Dance,” Ren commanded out in the Material Realm, and I did.

Without meaning to at all, I stood up from my chair and began to dance. I felt the spell forcing my movements, driving me to take step after step in the only dance I knew. I strained at the effect, returning to my vault to find it completely flooded with Ren’s aura. To no avail, I tried to push the spell from my mind, but all I did was create ripples in the power.

After only a few steps, Ren commanded “Stop!”

As quickly as I’d begun, I ceased my dancing and stood at the ready.

“That was the worst net dance I’ve seen,” she said “Are you really from a ship clan? Speak truthfully.”

The spell compelled me to answer, but I fought to keep the words in. Through bared teeth, I answered, “No, I pretend. My mother was cast out and we pretended to be Stormcallers to avoid the Tower’s attention.”

“That explains it,” she said, then as an afterthought added, “I don’t care that you’re a sorcerer by the way.”

To my minor surprise, I really didn’t care if she knew or that I’d spilled the secret. My attempt to hold the words back had been driven more out of pride than secrecy. I knew she wouldn’t care from our prior interactions, but in the past, I’d still felt a twinge of uneasiness whenever anyone in the resets learned of my secret. Now, I couldn’t care less.

“So, this is what's going to happen,” Ren explained. “I am going to teach you got to really do the net dance, and you can spend the spell's duration trying to figure out how to break free of the spell. Follow me.”

I followed her out of the room to the small ballroom that dominated her second floor, wherein she commanded me to dance, and I obeyed. As we danced, she corrected my terrible form, while I strained against the compulsion. I spent the whole time in my mental vault, trying in vain to force the spell from my mind and reinforce the cracks through which it had entered. Eventually, I gave up on trying to push it out and focused instead on sealing the cracks.

I was furious, but all I could do to express it was rage at the spell and frown slightly.

At my dower expression Ren commanded, “Smile, that's no way to look when dancing with a beautiful woman.”

Trapped behind a false smile, I fought for control. After fifteen minutes, my anger began to cool as I began to understand. While I battled in my mind, outside I continued to follow her commands. Each new command caused the spell in my mind to surge, the cracks to break open once more, and pulled me from my vault.

The technique is perfect—if extremely rude and potentially violating.

It allowed me to practice against all forms of mental attacks while teaching me to better master splitting my mind. All the while forcing me to pay attention to my surroundings as she ridiculed my terrible dancing.

After an hour, I'd failed to break free of the spell, and devoid of Will, I stood no chance to. On top of the mental exhaustion, my legs were killing me. I'd grown used to the fruits of not dying for two whole months straight and the sudden loss of my fitness gains was very noticeable. I began to contemplate blowing us both up when Ren dismissed the spell.

Taken by surprise by the loss of the compulsion, I fell limply to the floor.

Ren looked me over with a coquettish smell, "I'm impressed. A full hour before going limp. That's admirable."

Still lying on the ground, I groaned, "Do you have to ensorcell all of your partners?"

She chuckled softly at the barb, "Only the young ones."

I couldn't tell if we were still joking and frankly I didn't want to know. She had a suggestive look in her eyes I'd not seen before and I wasn't looking for any further dancing. So instead of replying, I drank a clarity potion and thanked her for the lesson, and made excuses to leave, forgoing her offers of a meal.

"Come back anytime," she said with a wink.

I think I preferred it when she wanted me dead.

Outside her door, I Teleported to Barion's stash, grabbed some coins, and then Teleported downstairs. It was lunchtime and the dining room of the Master's Den was full of Barion's staff. I dropped a purse of coin on the host's desk and told him to clear a table.

The man snatched the purse quickly and moved to kick some of Barion's guards from a small corner table.

I surveyed the room with disdain as I walked to my newly cleared seat. This place was a front for an abhorrent trade and housed an evil man and his staff. But... the food was good and if I went to the Parlor I'd likely get in a fight.

I ordered food and pulled you out to provide an update.

The training with Ren looks promising.

I have an idea for more training. Try to create a runed collar that will kill me if my mind is compromised. I think it will prove useful against the aboleth and I can test it against the harpy.

Dagmar should have some ideas, she said the Hardune have something similar that kills people that try to use magic

A few minutes later a reply came in Levar's hand.

Glad to hear it. I mean, glad to read it.

The collar is a good idea. I will discuss it with Dagmar.

After my meal, I Teleported back to my room and got to work sealing the cracks Ren had revealed in my mind. I'd already gotten too many of them, having given up on fighting back once it proved futile.

That must have been at least a fourth-tier spell. I should ask. I was expecting her to cast Sending or something.

Now that I'd experienced it, I could see the benefits of reinforcing one's defenses while undergoing a friendly mental assault. Aside from the fact that it's impossible to do so otherwise without a memory-enhancing ensouled artifact, it was also much faster. While I could identify the precise locations of defensive flaws, it took a long time to zero in on them. When under assault, it was impossible to miss. The end result was a far more effective application of Will that took far less time.

Once my Will had been exhausted, I took a nap. In an effort to maximize my available Will each day, Levar had directed me to a herb in his shop to take in place of the potions of forgone sleep. The plant, being a carnivorous plant distantly related to tea, had a magically stimulating property that would get me through the worst of my sleep deprivation symptoms, but still, allow me to nap to recover Will naturally.

“Why do you think you never recommended this herb to me during any of the resets?” I had asked when he suggested it.

Levar had looked but answered, “Well, you see... the herb is called Heirless Tea. Its use causes infertility and in some cases robs the imbiber of the ability to—” he coughed, pulling at his collar and blushing slightly before continuing “—perform the deed.”

Obviously, that wouldn't affect me with the resets, but it made sense then that he’d not have mentioned it.

Maybe I tell Ren I’d taken it to avoid the teasing.

No... she’d probably just use that against me.

At midnight, Simon woke me from my nap with a prearranged knock and room service. My Will was mostly recovered by then, and after eating I returned to building my defenses. After two hours, I was once more out of Will and I took my third clarity potion for the day and spent nearly forty-five minutes reinforcing my vault further before the deep whale excrement overdose made the last fifteen minutes of the reset extremely unpleasant.

Riloth 19th the 1148th-1151st

The few days, I refrained from approaching Ren, instead shoring up the cracks I still had yet to seal. After exhausting my Will, I went to the library to do some miscellaneous research to kill time. I returned to Ren after three days and underwent the same training with similar results. This time, I had been able to hold off her assault briefly, but ultimately failed and then found no way to break free.

During the assault, I had a sort of revelation. This spell, while great for revealing the cracks in my defenses, was far too powerful to practice against at pushing out active effects. It was like weight training, but instead of starting with lighter weights and progressively increasing it you instead started a weight you had no hope of even lifting.

Luckily, by then Levar had completed a collar that he claims would cut my head off using my own Will should my mind be compromised.

Yeah... that was a weird sentence. Anyway, it was time to revisit another old friend.

Riloth 19th the 1052nd

Finding the harpy’s lair from the air was slightly easier than finding the village. Now that time was not a constraint, I flew low over the road, and followed the path until I found the recognizable tree before flying up and in the general direction until the fort’s clearing became visible.

While heading toward the place in the air, I secured my runed collar, half expecting it to kill me right away. Once the tower was close in view, I sent part of my mind to my vault and aimed for the harpy’s perch.

I hope this works.

The rushing wind disrupted her song, but as I landed beside her, dismissing Fly, I felt the force of the magic pressing against my defenses. The cracks that I’d previously reinforced glowed faintly pink with the harpy’s aura, and through other cracks flowed a pink mist, flooding my mind.

In my vault, I threw my Will at the mist, pushing it back. At my attacks, the mist disappeared, not retreating as I expected.

The mist closed in, and I felt the magic beginning to influence me, but I was able to hold it back—if just barely. In the Material Realm, the harpy stared at me confused but sensed that something was off and began to reach for me with a talon. I abandoned my defenses momentarily to cast Hold Person on the avian monster, and once confident she was held in my grasp, returned to pushing off her attack.

I alternated between pushing the mist away and sealing cracks, but the mist continued to grow faster than I could disperse it. Eventually, I died, the collar activating without my notice and killing me before I knew what was happening,

Riloth 19th the 1053rd-1097th

The days that followed fell into an inconsistent pattern. I alternated between sessions with Ren and the harpy, spending the time between shoring up my defenses.

My ability to split my mind grew the fastest. Far before I could repel Ren's Compulsions, I no longer had to fear being forced out of my vault by anything short of intense pain. For instance, a harpy's talon pierces the chest.

Speaking of, my attempts against the harpy bore fruit early. After only four attempts I became able to push her fog from my mind. The key—which Ren told me when I got around to asking for advice—was to focus on flooding the vault with your own Will, forcing the invading magic away.

While focused blasts of Will worked great to repel, attacks and commands, mind reading and controlling effects needed a broader approach.

After my first success against the harpy, I grew a bit overconfident. On my next attempt to practice, the harpy regained control, and—not having donned the collar—I was once again forced to eat raw deer.

I kept the collar on after that and kept her influence out more times than not. With the state of my mental defenses changing each time, it seems that the harpy's magic shifted to find the best path, making each battle something new—time travel shenanigans being no guarantee of victory.

After two months of solitude, I even made progress with Ren. Her Compulsion spell didn’t always succeed, and she had to cast it again on a few occasions, but each time it failed, she seemed to tell that the failure was despite my efforts, not from them.

"Cabriolé," Ren commanded one day in the middle of my mental defense dance training.

Throughout all the mental training, my dancing skills improved greatly. A minor plus to the humiliating method. When my net dance had finally improved beyond the point of embarrassment, she'd instead decided to teach me a performative dance from a lost pre-Flood nation.

The dance involved a lot of lifting the arms and legs while spinning around and I was terrible.

Ren would demonstrate the moves each day, and then order me to copy them in rapid succession. On the day of my first modicum of success, I was standing with arms held high above my hands when the command to do one of the leaps came.

As I stood in my vault, patching holes and pushing the control back with a constant application of mental pressure, I sent a mental spike at the bolt of Ren's Will that intruded with the command. The construct fell apart, and I stood free, able to relax.

I stared down at my hands in awe, but Ren barked, "Cabriolé!" once more and with more force, and back to leaping I went.

“Nice job,” she said, before continuing the “training.”

I had no more success that day, but from then on, it was as if a veil had been lifted. Each day that followed. Each day I resisted more and more commands, until one day I resisted the spell entirely.

On that day, I sat on Ren’s couch sipping the offered beverage when the “surprise” attack came. Already in my vault, I waited as the sunset glow of her aura pierced my vault. I threw the full weight of my mind against the spell. There was a brief conflict where I felt the pressure of my own mind overwhelm the packaged power of the spell and then I watched as it fell apart.

“Oh,” she said, surprised and not a little impressed. She reassessed me visually as she was want to do whenever I surpassed her expectations. “You seem to have a pretty good grasp on it.”

“Umm,” I said, trying to recover. I’d just explained I wanted to improve my defenses, and then shown them to be quite formidable. “I meant I wanted to improve my mental defenses while fighting.”

She had been sitting on a couch, leg and peg crossed on the table between us with her arms spread out over the back of the seat. At my fumbled explanation she stood, a sinister smile spread across her face.

“Let's go outside.”