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“Ka’s side. What you’d call the Concurrence.”
“Veridius didn’t tell you about the Concurrence? Who we’re fighting? Why you’re here?”
“I suppose the war is the easiest place to begin. It started thousands of years ago, against an enemy called the Concurrence. They were bent on enslaving everyone, and from what Veridius and I could tell, at one point they were winning.” His mouth twists. “So our side split the world into three near-identical copies. Res—where we’re from; Obiteum, which is here; and Luceum. Don’t ask me how,” he adds with a wry smile.
“Physically the same, down to the last detail. But the nature of Will was what they were trying to limit. The three worlds were created because they wanted to diminish it, restrict how it could be used. Split its capabilities.” He presses on before I can ask any of my myriad new questions. “People called it the Rending. Afterward, the war continued, but the resistances on the three worlds began to have their own levels of success in the fight. Different capabilities with Will. Different choices. Everything diverged.”
“They’re culls, Vis. The Cataclysms are culls by an enemy that everyone on our world has forgotten. That one those architects were trying to prevent? It was the eleventh. The eleventh in three thousand years. And even with all their knowledge, they failed.”
“No, Vis,” he says, so quietly that I barely hear him. “There’s no way back.”
“Easy, Vis. We kill a god.”
Okay Kelsier
I have no idea where I am or even how long we’ve been travelling,
Buddy how’d you get kidnapped from the fucking academy
“When we are free, I am to take you to meet someone. I do not have their name, but I am told they will be known to you. Will speak your tongue,” the white-cloaked man adds quickly, seeing my doubts. “They will explain all.”
Oh is this the third planet or no ? I mean he has no arm but like …
And yet as I silently join the crowd of mourners, fingers brushing against the shape of the wooden ship in my satchel, I cannot help but ponder it once more.
Okay so last chapter was the other world why does he have no arm there though
Callidus’s body is already interred in the Ericius crypt. When I arrived a few hours ago, I asked to see my friend, one last time. I was told no.
:(
“He offered to free me from my father’s agreement,” he eventually says in quiet Cymrian.
“I thought the temptation would be too much. So I said no. And now our friend is dead.”
:(
“They say you carried him. All the way back to the Academy.” He finally looks across at me. Gaze drifting to my left side. “He was my friend,” I remind him softly. My voice does crack, this time.
“You put me in a tomb?” “It’s a very nice tomb. One of our nicest,” Caeror assures me,
lol
His eyes flood to black. With a rasping gasp, the dead man sits up.
HEH ?!
Except that back home, you imbue in order to strengthen and manipulate. Here, you do it to restore and sustain.
“Because Will shouldn’t be able to directly affect a living person.” I say it slowly. A reluctant concession. “Their body’s already controlled by their own Will, so it should be impossible to imbue them… you’re saying that Vitaeria come from this world? That we’re being imbued right now?” “All Vitaeria were created by someone using Obiteum’s form of Will, at least. And yes. We’re being imbued. It’s how our lungs are being preserved against the air out here.”
“I haven’t even been through the Aurora Columnae.” A protest, albeit a weak one. “Actually, you have, now—the Gate on Solivagus is a kind of extension of them. That’s why it won’t work on anyone who’s already been through the ceremony.”
Waaaaaaht
“Ka—the Concurrence—has a way of controlling the minds of iunctii. He leaves slivers of Will in their bodies, and a command to do something if we bring them back. Sometimes escape, report back our location. Sometimes murder everyone in their sleep. No way of knowing.” His voice is filled with distaste as he checks the bindings on Djedef’s hands. “You already had a small taste of it at the Labyrinth, I assume. If Djedef isn’t infected, he can be useful to us. To everyone’s survival. But we have to check.”
Oh so that’s why the girl tried to kill Vis
Then he steadies Djedef, and plunges the blade through his back.
Gah
“Those people were put in there to become a kind of interconnected machine, built to try and circumvent the security measures on Res that kill anyone who goes through the Gate.
A man who would remain untouchable so long as he alone was present in all three worlds, because it meant he had dominion over Will. Would be the only one who could control it as it had been before the Rending.” He glances at me. Assessing. “Synchronism, they called it.”
Veridius will undoubtedly be trying to do the same to his counterpart in Res—and perhaps if he realises you’ve made it through, the version of you there will end up succeeding before you ever have to do anything here.
OH THERES THREE FUCKING BAD GUYS ?!
Veridius will undoubtedly be trying to do the same to his counterpart in Res—and perhaps if he realises you’ve made it through, the version of you there will end up succeeding before you ever have to do anything here.
Okay well Veridius is either stupid or lying bc he told Vis to just wait until the Obiteum Vis defeated Ka ?
If we remove the Concurrence from this world, he is no longer Synchronous in Res. It stops the Cataclysm. And that is all that matters.”
“The one… trying to kill me. Ruarc. Who is he? Why do you… fight him?” While I have the energy, I want to understand at least that much. Cian’s lip curls. “He is a powerful new voice within the Grove. That is the draoi High Council,” he adds, guessing I won’t know the term. “His influence these past years has become too great, too quickly. He asks the Grove to ignore the Old Ways, and they do. It is his hand that guides their deal with King Fiachra. Do you remember the tempeall albios? The… white place?”
Ka ???
“Yes. There were… two others. A man and a woman. Like you.”
Woman? Does Caeror exist here too
“The Grove is intent on killing all who come to the tempeall albios in the way you did, because Ruarc has convinced them to. And they hide this shame from the other draoi. He asks them to kill without trial or explanation, and they obey, against all sacred duty.”
Oh Ruarc is so Ka
Spoilers* okay so now that I know it’s Caeror this makes no sense does Ka not exist anymore and is he just like a myth and it’s Caeror now - how did the Caeror in the original world die or is he actual synchronist and he’s just lying
A flash of steel. The ash staff is cleaved in two and clattering to the ground, Cian’s severed head rolling next to it as red blood sprays. There’s a breath where no one moves.
Bruh
Then I raise the scythe high, and aim for the corpse’s left shoulder.
Smart kid
“YOU SENT ME TO DIE!” I roar the words. Abrupt and violent. Stand and swipe my near-full cup from the table next to me, sending it shattering across the floor. “You valued your dead brother’s reputation over my life!” A step forward. “Because of you, I lost a gods-damned arm!” Another step. I’m pointing at him. Hand trembling. “Because of you, I had to make decisions that ended with my friend DYING!”
again. The illusion of power too often becomes power,
“It’s brighter than the one at Letens.” I make the observation abruptly. It was the first thing I noticed. That golden light was present, back then, but only barely visible during the day. “It’s not. They’ve all been getting brighter.” I frown. “I hadn’t heard that.” “It’s not talked about much, but twenty years ago they barely glowed at all. The prevailing theory is that it’s related to how many people have been through the ceremony.”
Making note of that
“I give my Will freely,” I whisper.
“Lanistia?” I frown at her. “What’s wrong?” She bares her teeth at me. It’s not anger. It’s confusion. Desperation. “Complete the journey, warrior,” she says sorrowfully. She has a dagger in her hand.
OH SHIT OH FUCK OH SHIT WTF
“Complete the journey, warrior,” she gasps, so softly that only I can hear it. She weeps it, this time. As if it is an apology. Her body goes limp as the squeezing chains finally rob the last of her breath, and she passes into unconsciousness.
Holy shit
A Harmonic Reaction ties two objects together: if one moves in space, so must the other. But crucially, their weight becomes that only of the heavier object—which is why Harmonics are so key to the Hierarchy’s machinery. “Weight paralletics,” they call it. The reason things like Transvects can work. Of course, I’m not concerned about how heavy we are, here. And in Res, people can’t be imbued. And a Harmonic Reaction with oneself isn’t possible. And Harmonics have nothing to do with somehow connecting to the gods-damned mind of another person.
Caecilius was the one who coined the term Harmonics; he described it as more than simply visualisation but rather something deeper, almost empathetic in nature. Not to think of the two objects as the same, but to find their hearts and imagine those as inseparably joined.
“Diago,” I eventually rasp, pointing to myself weakly. “Diago.”
😭
I wave my hand casually. “No, it’s fine! Happens to the best of us.”
LOL
“You could cede to me before taking it.”
LOL WHAT ?! Girl be for real
“No, Eidhin. No. I’m not alright.” There’s a massive hand on my shoulder. I look up to see Eidhin crouching in front of me. Eyes locked to mine. “Whatever you need,” he says quietly.
😭😭
Though rumour also has it that High King Úrthuile has been ailing these past months. And is without a direct successor.
even with mastery of the language. “I am…” How to say “in your debt”? I trail off. “Stupid?” suggests Gráinne. “Ugly?” pipes up Tadhg. I narrow my eyes at them. “I owe,” I say eventually. “I owe.” Gráinne smiles a sad smile. Onchú watches as the two children break past him, wrapping their arms around me.
🥲
“I will come back.” I say it to all of them. A promise. “I have been… happy. Happy.” A lump in my throat as I realise how true it is.
Let this bitch have his happy ending please 😭😭😭
While Caeror has his guesses, we don’t even know for sure what Will from Luceum is supposed to do.
“Is she happy?” He asks it eventually with about as much reluctance as anyone could ask such a question. “You said you didn’t want to know.” I make it a gentle reminder. “You said she needed to be dead to you.” A long pause, then, “I’ve changed my mind.”
:(
“I always thought I would be the one left in Res, you know.” He says it abruptly. “I knew that going through the Gate would copy me to Obiteum and Luceum. Or I thought I knew that. But in my head, I was going to be the one who stayed. It never really occurred to me that I would be the copy. Be here.”
So fucking confusing
“Would I know? Straight away, I mean.” I ask it uneasily. “If one of my other selves…”
How’d his copies die
