The Storm King

Chapter 1054: The Void

“Leon! My friend! It’s been too long! Too long!” Ambrose sprang from his chair the moment Leon entered the room where he’d been waiting and rushed over, pulling a surprised Leon into a brotherly hug.

“Ah, Ambrose,” Leon murmured awkwardly. It had been fifty years—more than half his lifetime—since the last time he’d seen the man, and he wasn’t familiar enough with the man for such an embrace.

Ambrose, however, ignored his discomfort for a few seconds longer. “How have you been, Leon? I couldn’t help but notice that you’ve achieved Apotheosis! And so soon! So soon!”

Finally, the aged immortal released Leon, and the Thunder King was relieved to see that the door had fully closed behind him, preventing anyone else from witnessing that exchange.

“I have. You say ‘soon’, but I say ‘finally’.”

Ambrose held up a finger and clicked his tongue in disagreement. “Fifty years is nothing to you, now, young man. When you get to be my age, that amount of time can pass in the blink of an eye! A blink of an eye!”

“I’m not that old, yet.”

“Yet. Yet. But let’s set all of that aside for now! How have you been doing over these short decades?”

Leon bitterly grinned at how flippantly Ambrose referred to the passage of time. Those fifty years had been a long time for him, and though he’d not gone out on any world-changing or life-defining adventures in those years, they had still been important years.

But he schooled his expression and answered as pleasantly as he could. “Quite well, Ambrose. I have ruled a prosperous Kingdom, I am surrounded by my family and friends, and I have achieved that which I have been looking forward to for so long.”

“Wonderful! Wonderful! All ought to be jealous of such a life! But… where you plan on going, there are many others just like you, aren’t there?”

Leon’s eyes narrowed as a sly smile wound its way to his face. “And where would I be going, exactly, Ambrose?”

“The Nexus! The Nexus! Don’t play with me now, Leon, not when I have awaited your visit in vain! Why haven’t you used that twig, might I ask?”

“It was never the right time. It’s a one-use item, so I should be damned ready for the Nexus when I use it.”

“Nonsense! Nonsense! If you ever need more, I shall give you more! You are always welcome in my Tower! Always welcome!”

“You’re too generous.”

“I believe I have not been generous enough, actually! Not generous enough!” An excited grin made its way onto Ambrose’s face. “Tell me, Leon… Tell me, have you tried to fly beyond the boundary of Aeterna, yet? Now that you’ve acquired origin power, you are capable of flying out into the Void unencumbered…”

“Funny you should ask that because I have… not. I’ve never even tried flying to the boundary.”

“What a shame, what a shame! Come! Fly with me!”

Without waiting for a response, Ambrose snapped his fingers and the wall opened into an adjacent hallway. A second finger snap had the wall of the hallway open onto a courtyard.

Leon could only stare in dejection at the ease with which Ambrose circumvented his defensive wards. His power had entered the stone like the wards hadn’t been there, moving the stone as easily as Leon might manipulate a single bolt of lightning, or a mortal might toss a pebble.

‘Such is how post-Apotheosis mages operate, I suppose.’ Leon followed Ambrose out through the holes in the walls he’d made, waving his Tempest Knights back as he did. He told the guard commander that he’d return shortly before joining Ambrose in the courtyard. With one last forlorn look at his bypassed defenses, Leon thought, ‘Going to have to figure something out to deal with origin power…’

“Now, let’s fly!” Ambrose declared before freezing and following Leon’s eyes. “Oh. Ah! Wait!” A third time Ambrose snapped his fingers, and all of the stones he’d moved returned to their original positions. In but a moment, Leon’s palace was completely fixed, not a stone out of place. With his new senses, Leon could even tell that all of his wards were intact, too. It was like Ambrose had never made those holes at all. “Now let’s fly!” Ambrose repeated more definitively and shot into the sky.

Leon sighed, and with some reluctance, followed the Grave Warden into the great blue yonder.

They moved at a fantastic speed, but for mages of their power, it was more than manageable.

From only a few dozen feet above, Ambrose called out, “Have you ever contemplated entering the Void without the aid of an ark before, Leon? Have you?”

“Yes! But I’ll admit that I’ve never considered what the Void actually does to a person, so flying through it has always been more fantasy than informed speculation.”

“Just do as I tell you, then! Follow me!”

Ambrose accelerated and Leon was forced to follow suit. Miles and miles they rose into the sky, the air thinning and cooling rapidly. Fortunately, Leon had no need to fear the lack of air or the temperature of high altitude.

Eventually, Ambrose began to decelerate, coming to a halt at a point where the air was practically nonexistent. Without air for sound to move through, Ambrose reached out to Leon with darkness magic, and Leon hesitated only a moment before allowing Ambrose to touch his mind.

[We’re almost at the barrier,] Ambrose explained, unconcerned apparently by Leon’s hesitation. [The point where Aeterna ends and the Void begins. Can you sense it? Can you?]

Leon reached out with his magic senses, feeling how not just the air had grown thinner but the air, too. About a quarter mile above them, however, was a ‘wall’ of sorts, invisible to the naked eye but giving off enough of an aura that it could be easily sensed. This wall wasn’t that powerful—Leon thought he could’ve made something of comparable power with his enchanting skills before he’d left the Bull Kingdom, if not comparable in scale—but spanned the entire sky. All of Aeterna lay beneath this weak wall of magic.

[Yes, I can.]

[I built it. Most planes have no need of such barriers, but those of the Divine Graveyard are special, you know. They’re special. Such means are needed to ensure a closed system, that no magic escapes the plane.]

[Will it give us any trouble? Or, I suppose since it’s your barrier, would it give anyone else not accompanied by you, trouble?]

[No. It’s not that kind of barrier. Such a barrier would be impractical and ineffective. This one is just to keep any possible hint of Godly power from escaping. That’s it. That’s it. But for us right now, it serves to separate us from the Void. Once we pass it, we will no longer be on Aeterna.]

Leon gravely nodded, but the Grave Warden treated the matter with considerably less gravity. After explaining what his barrier was, he paused for only a moment before flashing Leon a delighted smile and rocketing upward once again. Had there been more air around, Leon might’ve sighed. Instead, he rolled his eyes and followed.

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The barrier was no more hindrance to him than the film of a soap bubble; he felt nothing as he passed through the thin barrier, and left Aeterna behind.

As soon as he did, however, he immediately felt strange. For the first time in his life, there was nothing around him, and that meant that his body heat didn’t dissipate away. He didn’t mind the heat, though he could tell that weaker mages, let alone mortals, would die upon leaving the barrier. In fact, in contrast to his trapped body heat, he could feel his magic bleeding away from him at a noticeable rate. That concerned him far more greatly than anything else, as the rate magic bled away from him while he was on Aeterna was negligible—essentially just what magic he emitted as his aura.

He panicked slightly as magic power leeched out of his body and radiated out into the Void, and he began to falter above the barrier. The grip he had on himself with his magic—the mechanism by which he flew—was loosening as his magic was pulled out into the Void rather than staying by him. It felt disturbingly similar to how Planerend had prevented flight on Arkhnavi…

Leon tried to control his magic, but the more he tried to use it, the more radiated away. As Ambrose gave him an encouraging look, Leon gritted his teeth and forced himself to stop and take a moment to think. He had a few minutes before he fell back below the barrier, at least.

‘If only a post-Apotheosis can survive out in the Void, then that means that origin power is needed. Can I use origin power instead of magic power in a similar way? Or will it be ripped away just as my magic power was?’

Leon grimaced and internally shrugged. Though his supplies of origin power were far more limited than magic power, he still had enough to wrap around himself and fly, if he had to—and it seemed he had to.

So, with some nervousness—this was his first real test of using origin power, and on top of that, he could sense both the Thunderbird and Xaphan watching—he called upon his origin power.

It came to him easily, just as his magic did, but as it flowed through his body, he could feel the heat that was building within him alleviating. As his origin power began to coat his skin, his magic stopped leaking out that way. Most reassuring of all, his origin power was not ripped away from him to radiate into the empty Void as his magic was, and remained sticking to his body, entirely under his control.

[Looks like you’re getting the hang of it,] Ambrose proudly stated. [You’ll figure out better techniques later, I’m sure, but for now, let’s rise a little higher. A little higher…] Taking a much lazier pace, Ambrose drifted further upward, and Leon followed suit. They only stopped when they had reached the halfway point between Aeterna and its sun.

When Ambrose finally stopped, he turned around to gaze upon his plane and indicated for Leon to do the same. When he complied, Leon was struck completely speechless. Even the occasional furtive glance he’d taken behind him couldn’t compare; sensing the entirety of Aeterna with his magic senses was one thing, but seeing it with his own eyes from such a vantage point was another.

All of the plane could be seen, from the rough sea at the center of the plane to the tall mountains that ringed it. The Endless Ocean was decidedly less so, lapping at the shores of the continent of Aeterna just as it did those border mountains separating the ocean from the Void.

In the north, he could see the Bull Kingdom. Though he’d only spent a few years there, they were years that would stick with him until his dying days. To the north lay the Northern Vales, his childhood home. At his level of power, he could even see the clearing of purple grass where he’d once lived. Only a few burned beams remained of the compound he’d lived in with Artorias, but in the spot where the obelisk had once been, and upon which Leon had built Artorias’ cairn, he could see the golden foliage of a young Heartwood tree.

His gaze moved south, touching everywhere he’d ever stopped, every place he’d visited or called home. The memories of those places flooded through him, bringing with them such a wave of nostalgia that he could hardly stand to look for long.

But he remained strong, taking in the sight. It was indescribably beautiful.

He wasn’t sure how long he floated in the Void staring down at Aeterna, and when he turned back to Ambrose, the attitude of the smiling Grave Warden gave him no clues. It seemed that he was patient enough to simply let Leon have this moment. Only when they made eye contact did Ambrose speak again.

[Quite the experience, isn’t it? To see an entire plane from above. Everywhere you’ve ever lived and loved, spread all before you like a map on a table.]

[But more than that. Though my Kingdom may look small on a map, I can still see how large it is from up here. It’s just… I can feel the scale. The weight of it. The people. They are all down there. I can see them all.]

Ambrose nodded and let another moment of silence linger.

[Have you considered when you’re going to leave?] he eventually asked.

[Still working on that,] Leon answered. [I figured I’ll go first to scout the Nexus with some trusted friends and followers. Then, once we find a good place to settle, will we return for everyone else.]

[No need for that. No need. I have taken the liberty of doing that beforehand.]

Leon’s golden eyes turned to Ambrose in mild confusion. [How? You don’t leave the Divine Graveyard, right?]

[My apprentice is out in the universe searching for any sign of Planerend. And if word of a freed Primal Devil travels, then it will inevitably travel to the Nexus. So, he occasionally stops by to check in with those powers who make the Nexus their home. It was a simple matter to ask him to take a few days and look for possible spots for you to set up. I have a list of possible sites. Take it. Take it.]

Ambrose took out a crystal the size of Leon’s index finger and handed it to him. Leon took it but didn’t use it just yet. Instead, he turned back to Aeterna, gazing upon the plane that had been his home for so long.

He would likely think of the plane as his home for as long as he lived.

[Would you… object to me returning, on occasion?]

Ambrose silently laughed. [Of course not! We are friends, are we not? We are friends!]

A small smile spread across Leon’s face. [Yes. Friends. I suppose we are.]

With Ambrose, Leon remained in the Void for a while longer. When Leon tired of simply staring at Aeterna, Ambrose goaded him into traveling through the Void as fast as he could. With origin power and without air resistance to get in his way, Leon found that he could travel much faster through the Void than he could outside of it—so much so that if he ever wanted to return to the Bull Kingdom, it would undoubtedly be faster to travel through the Void rather than making a straight journey. By the time Leon started to tire, his relatively small reserve of origin power taxed hard from flying so far and so quickly, he’d found that he could push himself so fast that he could go from Stormhollow to the Bull Kingdom’s capital in less than an hour.

‘Not fast enough to easily travel between planes, though,’ Leon speculated. There was a reason arks were used even by post-Apotheosis mages, after all.

[Come, let us return,] Ambrose stated. [It’s been some time.]

Leon nodded. The sun, burning so brightly that even he had to squint slightly to look upon it, had moved even farther and faster than he had, telling him that he’d been gone for a few hours. So, he and Ambrose began making their way back to Stormhollow.

Their return journey didn’t take long, and upon their return, Ambrose asked to stop several thousand feet above the palace.

“Leon,” he said, “don’t be a stranger. We have much I’d like to talk about, and not just about your sojourn into the Nexus. My Aeterna is your home, or such is how I’d like you to think of it. You are always welcome, in my hall or on my plane.”

He laid a hand on Leon’s shoulder and smiled, his plain features alight with fondness and friendliness.

“Nothing demands that your departure be permanent. Nothing demands either that all of your people must follow you, or all at once. This is their home, too, and that must be kept in mind. But we can talk about that later. For now, I believe an old friend is waiting for you…”

Leon followed Ambrose’s gaze and laid eyes upon Clear Day. The tau was in his aged human form, sitting on a terrace quietly sipping tea. His red eyes were narrowed with delight, but they did flicker upward every now and then, and when he noticed that he’d been noticed, he raised his cup to them.

“Known Clear for long, have you?” Leon asked.

“Clear? Ah, the name he must be going by, now. Yes, I’ve known him a long time. In the long span of time that Aeterna has existed, a grand total of seven people have achieved Apotheosis upon it. Clear was the fifth. You are now the eighth.”

“What happened to all the others?”

“Of those seven, only Clear and my apprentice remain with the living. One died when your Clan invaded the plane. Two more died in the Nexus when it was learned they were from the Divine Graveyard—remind me to talk about that, later. The remaining two died when they sought to invade my tower without my leave.”

“Brutal.”

“It wasn’t. I made short, clean work of it.”

Leon softly snorted. He briefly looked northward, noting that Anastasios and the Grand Druid were now past Raven territory and speeding ever closer.

“I should get back to work. But thanks for this, Ambrose. This has been an experience I didn’t know I needed.”

Ambrose nodded again. “Any time, Leon. Any time. Analyze what’s on that crystal I gave you, and get back to me. Think about what you want for the future, and where Aeterna might fall into those plans, then get back to me. Get back to me.”

With that, Ambrose gave him a needlessly formal and ceremonial bow, then vanished.

“I will,” Leon said to empty air. “I will.”