The flight to Prismarche was littered with obstacles, but none individually problematic. Simply voidbeasts of varying strength. More of the same, even if 'the same' couldn't be described as inconsequential.
Those powerful beasts were more numerous once they left Meridian, and she knew it was because the breach had called everything nearby to come flooding in. She'd dealt with hundreds of square miles of those strongest beasts, and had subsequently eradicated the majority of the infestation. Putting appropriate distance from Meridian returned the fauna to their regular levels, so to speak.
She was forced to take a more sedate pace than she'd have preferred. The sky was far from empty like in the real world. Gigantic voidbeasts were common, blocking their way and sensing her despite her obfuscation spells, which she was continuously iterating upon.
Considering her maximum speed, she might be able to zip past unnoticed, but some of the [Greater Voidbeasts] were outrageously fast too, and had specialized attacks, beams of void-energy that behaved fundamentally the same as their carapace. Those void-energy projections were rare, all things considered, though maybe Vivi only thought that because of how short her encounters with most of the monsters were.
Nevertheless, clearing a path was safer for Isabella, since Vivi could never be totally certain that her shields would hold. She had yet to perfect her spells against the foreign energy.
Killing voidbeasts in such quantities was burning through her mana pool, but she had no choice. She needed to learn as much as possible. Returning home meant she was going to have to pierce the dimensional boundary one way or another…and no matter how delicate her efforts, she might be responsible for another event like the breach at Meridian. If something of the sort did come to pass, she needed to be capable of ending the invasion single-handedly. She refused to allow another mass casualty event.
Potential solutions brewed in her mind, which she used the long flight to expand and refine. One idea in particular felt promising, and she tentatively shelved it as her current plan. Having an emergency course of action set out relaxed her no small amount, though she would definitely prefer one that wouldn't be so…unpleasant for her afterward.
She and Isabella were nearing the border of the Central Kingdom when they ran into something of note that wasn't just another Voidbeast.
At first, seeing the shadow of those great ridges rising up to the clouds, Vivi thought it a mountain. After a short delay in which she registered that there shouldn't be a range in this part of the Central Kingdom, she startled, then slammed the two of them to a stop.
"What? What is it?" Isabella asked in alarm.
Vivi stared.
A simple [Inspection] confirmed her suspicion.
"Wait. What is that?" Isabella breathed, realizing, finally, that the faint outline far in the distance was no mountain.
"The Colossus," Vivi said simply. After a brief pause, she added, "Or the memory of it."
***
An Echo of a Great Beast
***
In retrospect, it made complete sense that the Cataclysms would have left their marks—scars—on the world, even a hundred years later, to the extent that they had impressed into this void-realm a Concept to be represented by. She should have predicted it, even.
A Great Beast. Simple and encompassing, there was no other way she would have labeled that titanic creature.
"I've seen depictions, of course," Isabella mumbled. "But…a painting could never…"
Indeed, even Vivi felt somewhat humbled, seeing the Colossus in the flesh. Her memories from Seven Cataclysms had always been muted by the lack of true fidelity, and the knowledge that she'd been inside a game.
Here was a mountainous monster, literally, that was real. Or, sort of. An echo of that beast among beasts. It was slightly transparent like the other Concepts, not quite as vibrant as she or Isabella, but the sight was breathtaking nonetheless.
"How do you even kill something like that?" Isabella asked.
"Very carefully," Vivi replied dryly.
Isabella let out an incredulous huff.
The two of them spent a few minutes observing the continental shadow with a solemn and admiring gaze—admiring in the sense that a person could admire an erupting volcano, or any natural disaster. Eventually, Vivi spurred them forward.
"We're heading toward it?" Isabella stammered. "Really?"
"I don't think it will attack."
"Think? I want more than think," Isabella cried. She froze. "S-sorry, Lady Vivisari. It's just…it's the Colossus!"
"It's an Echo of a Great Beast," Vivi corrected. "I'm assuming it encompasses more than just the Cataclysm. The Colossus is simply the most common representation, so it's what we see. The same way High King Alistair the First is the man most people think of when it comes to virtuous kings, so he was who we saw."
"I…suppose that makes sense?" Her tone remained trepidatious. "Still. You think it won't attack?"
She had a strong suspicion it wouldn't, nearly a certainty, but she guessed not total confidence. "We'll be fine. Even if it's stronger than the original, I could deal with it if I needed to."
The statement sobered Isabella. Vivi had meant to reassure, not brag, though it had probably come out that way regardless.
The Great Beast inspired stronger awe the closer she got. An identical sense to what she might receive when staring at an incoming tsunami. Terrifying and inevitable, yet wondrous, for all the destruction soon to be wrought. The Great Beast evoked less human emotions than the other Concepts—or maybe more human. Primal in nature.
The beast mirrored the Colossus down to every detail. If she had to pick a single animal, imperfect as the comparison would be, she would say it was a turtle, with a ridged shell and four squat legs that could flatten towns with a step. Its face was blunt, and within its enormous eyes burned orange, smoldering flames.
It didn't attack as they neared, confirming her suspicion. In fact, on the way over, she watched its enormous jaws snap out to gobble up a [Greater Voidbeast]. A motion that looked ponderous from afar, but only thanks to its sheer scale. Mountains always looked slow when they moved.
For a while, Vivi floated around the huge creature and studied it. But, like the other ghosts, its existence meant little, practically speaking.
Besides one crucial realization. If this Cataclysm had an echo, wouldn't the others?
Seeing how their destination was Prismarche, that was definitely something to be concerned about.
***
Half a day later, the next event of substance transpired.
She had burned through a third of her potion-restored mana pool by then, simply from peeling apart [Greater Voidbeasts].
Defensive spells were her focus. She desperately wanted to regain her confidence when it came to layering a bubble around people she cared about and being certain nothing could penetrate it. Perfecting her shields mattered much more to her than her offensive abilities. And she was fortunately making good progress toward that goal—they were becoming quite durable, even against the strongest of the voidbeasts. The progress was coming at the expense of a dwindling mana pool, though.
She could quaff at least two more potions before worrying about serious drawbacks, but she had more or less resigned herself to manaburn by the end of this adventure. Because, even if this hunting didn't exhaust her, her current plan on how to safely make a return trip would.
The event of substance wasn't a monster, this time. A [Lance of the First Dawn] tore through a level 1962 [Greater Voidbeast]—one of the strongest she'd seen, but not of actual note—when several notifications appeared to block her vision.
Maybe the words shouldn't have shocked her so much, but they did.
***
Level Up!
You are now a level 2110 [Archmage].
***
Vivi froze.
She hadn't known she was capable of leveling. Seven Cataclysms' soft limit had been two-thousand—that was where the game's content had ended. As one of, if not the most prolific players, she'd pushed far past that cap by sheer hours played, to the point she'd been the highest in the world.
She supposed killing hundreds of Cataclysm-level monsters would be pretty good for barreling past that supposed limit, even more so than running endgame raids. So of course she'd eventually garnered enough experience to tick up another increment.
Still. She just hadn't expected it, for some reason.
That only accounted for half of her surprise. The other shock stemmed from the fact she saw another screen behind the first.
Which meant a skill?
She wasn't embarrassed to admit to a burst of excitement. What sort of ability would she get? Skills and spells were one of the fuzzier ways this new existence had translated across worlds. Obviously, Vivi hadn't spent decades studying spell diagrams. Spells in the game had mostly come from leveling up, quests, and other achievement-based storylines. They'd been transplanted into her head when she'd woken in this world.
Saffra had told her that skills for mages overwhelmingly presented as passive bonuses and similar, though not always. So would Vivi get something like that? It could go either way; obviously, she wouldn't be surprised if she was the exception.
With great anticipation, she closed out the level-up notifier, allowing the screen behind it to appear.
***
Skill Earned!
[Void Resistance I]: Grants a small bonus to resisting and penetrating Void effects.
***
If she'd thought about what she might receive, a skill of that ilk would have topped the list. But she hadn't, and so her eyebrows rose.
Weirdly, Vivi almost felt like it was cheating, the Grand System aiding her in a task she'd been so focused on the past twenty-four hours. But that was the whole point of the System. It helped a person specialize. Acknowledged a person's efforts and gave them skills to help them along their path.
If anything, the [Codex of the Hollowed Sun] was the closest thing to a 'cheat' she'd gotten. She just hadn't made great use of it, since too little time had passed to store appropriate amounts of mana. Something she would be prioritizing heavily when she returned.
She was utterly fascinated by how the bonus would manifest. What the new efficiency would look like to her magical senses. She itched to find out.
"Lady Vivisari?" Isabella asked tentatively.
Vivi's eyes, glazed over in contemplation, focused. She blinked at the teenager who had flown over with a concerned look.
"Er," she said. "Yes, I just—" She had no reason to distrust Isabella, but neither did she see a reason to explain the level-up and skill. "It's nothing. I was distracted, briefly. Let's continue."
Isabella nodded hesitantly, obviously curious, but not willing to press for an answer.
Their trip resumed.
***
They reached Prismarche in roughly a day of travel. Vivi by default had no need of sleep, at least not on a regular schedule—she might need it eventually. She only did so to maintain normality, and because it felt nice. Isabella, on the other hand, surely should have needed some, but even twenty-four hours hadn't exhausted her. Probably because, as Vivi had observed numerous times, she really doubted that this half-world existed in any traditional sense. Their bodies weren't physical. They were here conceptually, or magically—whatever that meant.
Nearing the prominent defensive city nestled at the top of the Northern Kingdom, Vivi felt her anticipation grow with every mile. What would she find? 'Nothing' seemed an improbable answer. It had been the immense hammer-blow onto the dimensional barrier in Prismarche that had first alerted her to a potential Eighth Cataclysm, no matter how much she had tried to deny the possibility back then. And something had caused it; something had tried to force its way in from the other side.
Maybe the offending entity had fled—nearly a week had passed, if time held normal sway in this domain. But there would surely be hints. If not the void-creature itself, then magical phenomena, or…she had no idea what.
Which was why she flew in with equal parts trepidation and excitement. The trepidation was more for Isabella than herself, of course. Was it arrogance, the general lack of concern she carried toward her own wellbeing? It had to be. Then again, her powers had never failed her. Not in the sense of her life being risked. No, her worries were centered on all the squishy beings she surrounded herself with—like the traumatized teenage girl in her custody, and the second one back home.
She almost wasn't sure this other side of reality would mirror her own. But as she flew in from the far horizon, a great shattering came into view, reminiscent of Prismarche's dimensional anomaly. If anything, the shards seemed further-spanning and more jagged. Probably because the damage here had been more thorough. This was where the hammer had struck the anvil.
Anticipation turned to dread as she sensed the mana currents in the air. Something more was at play. Magic as she understood it, not something Void, which didn't make sense.
A ritual. The same that had caused the splintering, or different?
As she neared, the magical phenomena clarified to her senses, and she began to understand. Her stomach sank to the ground.
She recognized this handiwork.
"Stay near me," Vivi said grimly. "Don't speak unless I tell you to."
Isabella took that command seriously, blue eyes widening before her expression firmed.
Vivi floated toward the center of Prismarche's town square. A [Detect Presence] all but confirmed her worst suspicion. A Concept existed down there.
She had expected some void-creature stronger than even the [Greater Voidbeasts], or perhaps a Cataclysm, coming to Prismarche. But not this Cataclysm. Prismarche had been near the domain of the Ashen Hierophant.
And yet…
A young man stood in the center of Prismarche, the entire town square etched with arcane symbols, and a blanket covering some lumpy object. An ongoing ritual suffused the air with magic—magic that Vivi could read the intent of.
He straightened out, abruptly, feeling Vivi despite her magical safeguards. Safeguards that had grown remarkably resistant to void effects, through both practice and her recent skill.
But he was not void. He was of their world, in a sense. And even his echo was so skilled a mage that he could see through her.
The young man—almost a boy, really, seeming in his late teens, however false Vivi knew the impression—was tall and gangly, with a mop of black hair and round spectacles perched on his nose. A huge grin split his face, and he waved at the patch of air that should have been empty to his eyes. It was a vigorous, effusive movement, full of vitality, and the display shocked her. Because it indicated something crucial.
Not the Cataclysm as she knew it, then, but the origin of the man? She recognized his face, and the exuberance he displayed, from his backstory. Here was a man who loved magic more than anything in the world. It was almost an endearing sight, the man without the twitching, erratic madness infecting the Cataclysm she'd fought against.
"Vivisari!" he called. "I knew you'd show up sooner or later. Don't ask me how," he joked. "You couldn't handle the answer, not even as you are now."
He knew who she was. And could speak. None of the others had done that. But of any existence she knew, of course this one would break the rules she had roughly sketched out. Rule-breaking was his very foundation.
Her dread doubled. In any conceptual sense, this had been the Cataclysm most feared by the world. The Ashen Hierophant had killed more than disease and hunger, but even he wasn't spoken about with such grim whispers. Death was just death. This man had brought about fates far worse than that.
Vivi hovered for a long moment. Eventually, studying her surroundings and the ritual, resignation swept through her. She set down, dispelling the pointless [Invisibility].
"Remian Voss," she said.
The young man's smile slipped. He looked away, trying to maintain his upbeat demeanor, but a grimace overtook him.
"Ah," he said, running a hand through his shaggy black hair. "Don't call me that, Vivisari. Even if this is just an echo, I don't deserve to use that name. Call me what I am."
Vivi was silent for a moment.
"The Shattered Oracle, then."
He smiled, somehow both sad and cheerful. He spread his arms. "Quite right!"
Or, as Vivi's [Inspection] suggested:
***
An Echo of He Who Glimpsed Infinity
***