The Newt and Demon

“Been a while since I’ve done some testing,” Theo said to no one in particular. “Are you going to work with me today?”

After having dinner, Theo and Tresk had retreated into the Dreamwalk. It didn't seem as though it would fight against him tonight. After all, he had already created the potions he intended to test, so it shouldn't have had anything to complain about. Of course, Trask had already summoned the image of the dragon she had tried to fight and was currently battling it, claiming that she could have beat it, ‘IRL’.

At least she had agreed to set the scene near the ocean so he could test these potions properly.

First was the easiest potion to test. Theo had to convince the Dreamwalk not to drown him as he walked into the sea. He had imagined a drop-off that would allow him to ensure the pressure potion worked properly. It wasn’t shocking when he moved around the depths—weighed down by a rock—and nothing happened. He could feel the pressure pushing in from all sides, but nothing else. But he wasn't crushed by the depths.

Just to put the potion through its paces, he swam his way to the surface, expecting to feel the effects of rapid depressurization. But once again, nothing happened. It was a delightful outcome to an uncertain potion. While he was in the water, he checked the Echo potion, which worked far better than it did on the surface.

"Two down, two to go," Theo said. It was time to test the bombs. Well, he didn't expect anything mind-blowing. It was always very important to know exactly how a potion worked, no matter how specific the description seemed. It could often react in unexpected ways.

Goblins were always an excellent testing dummy. A small goblin appeared on the beach. Looking around in confusion, Theo had imagined it with no purpose. So it just stood there as he prepared to toss a Drown Bomb. It turned out that watching a goblin drown on dry land wasn't as entertaining as Theo had expected. It was exactly as the potion described. The goblin seemed to be without air for a while before he un-imagined it.

But it wasn't as bad as the constrict bomb. The pressures of the deep sea could apparently do some seriously nasty stuff to a body, and the alchemist didn't wish to remember it. It was a horrible day to have a perfect memory.

With time left to screw around, Theo checked out his various core levels of interest. Right now, he was mainly focusing on his alchemy and herbalism cores, but something interesting would happen soon with his Tara’hek core. It had been sitting at level 39 for quite some time, seeming reluctant to roll over to level 40. While his other cores were bound to the maximum level of his two primary cores, this one just didn't care.

Tresk and Alex landed nearby. The marshling jumped down and placed her hands on her hips in pride. "I could have beat that dragon," she said, grinning. "If Elrin hadn't come and taken it from under me, that would have been my kill."

“Speaking of Elrin,” Theo said, "I've wanted to get all the throne holders together, along with him, for a meeting. Do you think you have time to do that tomorrow?”

“Where we meeting?”

“I think Kahak would be best. I don't know if Kahar can travel outside of the Arbiter Citadel.”

"Yeah, but can Fenian and Elrin travel through the void?" Tresk asked.

"It should be possible," Theo said with a shrug. "Fenian travels through it often, even if it's over the bridge of shadows. And Elrin has a special affinity with the shards. I'm sure it'll be fine."

"Or they'll explode," Tresk said, nodding. "Anyway, yeah, I'm down for it. But does this mean you're delaying bringing the rest of the space elves back?"

"Just by a day," Theo said. "I think the healers could use more rest.”

“Cool. I’m gonna kill another dragon.”

###

“If that’s what you wish,” Elrin said through the communication crystal. “I’ll be in your town soon.”

Elrin hung up before Theo could correct him. It was a city now, not a town, even if it was a tiny city. He sighed, looking across the table at Fenian and nodded. Theo, Tresk, and Fenian had gathered in the Marsh Wolf Tavern to have breakfast. Sarisa and Rowan were thrilled that they didn't have to make food and had been sent off to do whatever they wanted on their own today.

"What exactly is this meeting about?" Fenian asked.

"Everyone who holds a throne has a duty to the planet," Theo explained. "We all have our parts to play, and I wanted to make sure we're playing them correctly."

"And what about Elrin? Why have you added him to the mix?" Fenian asked.

"He doesn't hold an official throne now, but I think he did in the past," Theo said. "Even if he doesn't, he has a special relationship with the shards, which we've already determined are very important."

"I don't recall if he had a throne," Fenian answered honestly. "He kept a lot of stuff from us, but then again, he had the weight of the world on his shoulders. Well, actually two worlds."

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"He's too insular," Theo said. "We need to make him feel like he belongs to this group."

"You might have trouble with that one," Fenian said. "Back in the day, we established a guild to help protect the world. He was always dropping in here and there, but it never seemed like he truly fit in."

"Doesn't matter how hard it is," Theo said. "He's too powerful not to draw into the fold, and I don't think he's a bad guy. Was he a bad dude back in the day? Seems like he had a couple of enemies."

"Twist" is a bit of an exception," Fenian explained. "The man has never told me the full story, but he always said he didn't belong in our world. And Jan had a personal vendetta against him for something that he was completely wrong about."

"What about that vendetta?” Theo asked.

“Here's how it worked. Earth and the Iaredin were symbiotically linked. From what I understand, the people on Earth were given a chance to come to our world. They could pick one of two options. The first was to visit. They could come and go as they pleased. But the second was to come permanently.”

"And Jan was involved in this somehow," Theo said. "Did a loved one of his go to the other world permanently?"

"Exactly. From what I understand, his cousin or nephew had an incurable disease and chose to reach the other world permanently for a new body. It worked out very well for him, but of course, Jan wasn't happy about it. He fought with Elrin when the carnage spilled to Earth, but he could never win."

The story about Earth before his time got wilder every time Theo heard it. None of this was in the history books he remembered. And he could only explain it away by considering the way his governments controlled information. There was also the possibility that the knowledge was lost, seeing as so many years had passed.

"So does anybody know how Elrin got so strong?" Theo asked.

“He never really told us directly, but from what I saw, he had three things on his side. The first was that he didn't sleep. Ever. He doesn't need to rest to regain his stamina and can keep going almost indefinitely. There were stories about him fighting against hordes of monsters for days on end without taking a break.”

“Well, that would be a powerful ability.”

“The second was his crafting. People were limited to only accepting one crafting profession and one gathering profession, but that rule didn't apply to Elrin. He could do it all, and he did. Blacksmithing, goldsmithing, tailoring, carpentry. He leveled it all and reaped the rewards. He could also make items that were more powerful than the ones the other crafters could make.” Fenian took a long pause after this one, seeming to fall back into his memories. “I used to beg him for his wares. That’s where I made some of my highest profits.”

“What’s the last point?” Tresk asked impatiently.

“The last one is simple,” Fenian said, "Logistics. One of the biggest problems we had was moving people from one place to another. Now, you'll remember, most of this war took place in the area now occupied by Tarantham. There were several major cities all linked with airship networks, but getting from one place to another could take days. During an attack on the city of Perisart, we only had a meager force to defend it. All our people were in the field. The overland trip took about a week. The commander of that siege had been half a world away when the attack started, and arrived in about an hour.”

“Elrin,” Theo said with a nod.

“Indeed. He made the trip from Hallben to Perisart in a few hours and rallied the troops. Of course, he held favor with the royal elven family, so they provided him with a cadre of mages and the fiercest company of elven warriors led by Silvain.” Fenian shivered. “Gods, what I wouldn’t give to see that man fight again.”

So Elrin had three big cheats that allowed him to rise to power, and it wasn't surprising since that old world experienced a reset from what the Alchemist understood. Everybody was put back to level one, and they had to work their way back up. If Elrin didn't have to sleep and he could craft and go anywhere he wanted in a blink, he would’ve risen to power extremely quickly.

“Good to know more about the guy,” Theo said. “He always seemed like a brooding loner.”

“Well, he had a family back then,” Fenian said. “His mother and father were alive when the swap happened, so I imagine they’re still here somewhere.”

“Damn, that’s kinda rough,” Tresk said.

“We made it work somehow. Do either of you know how this new-new world is going to pan out?”

“I only have guesses,” Theo said with a shrug. “But I think all our realms will be different worlds. Travel between them might be difficult.”

“I guessed as much. Any idea how much of our powers translate?”

Theo tapped his chin. He really wasn’t certain. “How much of your power translated from the old world?”

“Dunno. I have a system message that has been blinking for about 100 years that I’ve ignored,” Fenian said with a shrug. “From what Jan said, it combines your current class with the old one if you accept the message. The system placed him pretty high, so he got a head-start.”

Theo didn’t think the system would do a one-to-one migration of their cores and levels. He had a feeling it would rewrite the system, taking the chance to make things right. The last time Iaredin was migrated, the system had been constrained by something. It was almost as though it wasn’t fully awake, which might have been why the space elves were able to steal the shards. But now that both the regular system and the monitor system were working correctly, it would restart everything.

This could come as a total rework of the system, where everyone lost everything. Or it could bring over some stuff…

“How different is the leveling system here compared to your time?” Theo asked.

“A lot different. We didn’t have cores,” Fenian said with a laugh. “We were locked into one class that we could change through evolution. It favored gaining levels rather than going wide.”

“That makes sense. My theory is that the system will reboot us once again. If we retain the core system, I think we’ll have something closer to the specialized main core and sub core system,” Theo said. “I can’t really guess if the system wants to keep seed cores, though. That seems like a system design to encourage destruction.”

“You think so?” Fenian asked with a smile. “Yes, it is a devious aspect of the system that allows nations to rebuild overnight.”

“This place has sixty-thousand years of history none of us here know about,” Theo said. “How messed up is that? How many lives came and went?”

“Too many,” Tresk said.

“And here we are! At a brave new frontier!” Fenian said, hosting his glass of fruit juice in the air. “We’ll reforge this world to make it better.”

“I’ll drink to that,” Theo said, toasting with his tea.

Tresk ate a sausage in celebration.

Breakfast went well after that. It was nice having Fenian around again. Especially since there was nothing for them to do before Elrin arrived. When they were done eating, they went out and appreciated the statue the elf had commissioned for Salire and Xol’sa’s wedding. The stillness of the morning was broken when a shriek issued in the distance. The bells of the town rang.

Theo spotted it and shook his head.

“Hold on, I gotta call Aarok and his boys off,” Theo said, opening his administration interface. “Elrin is riding in on his dragon.”