The realm was gone in more ways than one. To begin with, it was suffering from the mana drain. So, there was that. And then there was the fact that I was stuck in this bedroom, in a mansion built to be cut off from everything.
Also, I was a human.
As a human I had taken to embroidery and dressmaking. Dresses because I was tired of wearing the same clothes. Embroidery because that was the cheapest way to prepare magic patterns in my situation.
Then, from time to time, I would look at my reflection in the mirror. Those tender hands, that gracious face, those chopped brown hair. It would at least merit a brooch.
Outside, in the hallways, the mist receded to nothing, only surging back when my host, that monstrous bird, came to hear my pretend to play the harp. I would say something about the master and it would leave again in a hurry.
That was me.
How was the actual human doing?
When the portal closed, that should have been that. But whether she had reestablished contact or some strange phenomenon was at play, I was still synched with her. Or rather, I could perceive what she was doing.
She seemed oblivious of that.
My mistress was now a joyful clay golem that, ache aside, was blissfully reveling in her experiments. She was busy dissecting her own arm, in fact. Right on the table, she had put her arm down and removed a plate and was now regretting everything.
Then, through the pain, she would pick a sample of soft clay and test its chemical reactions. I swore she was planning to turn lead to gold and, well, she was a human. And a clay golem too. It would be trivial for her.
Now and then she tapped in the empty air, working on that famed system humans had. Probably assigned whatever she called wisdom points was.
And while she did that, her ship, the Parao, still glided in the dry desert, full ahead toward the kingdom of Wekel. What she hoped to find there was beyond me.
She got interrupted anyway.
A shockwave, too strong for the ship's featherweight runes to absorb, had her slam against the table and down on the floor. The stupid rapt monster that was with her onboard got up and panicked.
She rushed out to see, far in the horizon, a bright red beam slowly distort and fade. No sound but a storm had formed from that direction, rolling toward her.
Her reaction was swift. Up to the bridge, to pull the ropes, lower the sails on the crossed masts and brace.
Even then the winds threatened to capsize the whole vessel. Had it had a single hull, it would have probably crashed; but by dropping the featherweight spell she prevented the ship from being lifted and rolled.
After a few minutes that tempest receded, living only dust. The red beam was still visible through it, but had broken down into thin seams that were almost gone.
She worked on her system.
"At that level, another human? No..." She talked to herself. "A breached storage? Maybe. Unlikely. Think, if insulation was that common..."
She couldn't tell that the ray had been going down anyway? Was her power source on the cosmic ceiling?
She was trying to bite her finger with a faceless golem head, which frustrated her more.
"Dispersion. Which means fast transport. Even then, that's three to fourth dungeons worth of..."
I let my sewing down to sigh. The fast transport of magic had pretty much reduced the list of suspect to only one monster I knew of.
That damned wyvern skeleton.
She had probably come to the same conclusion, pointed her finger in the direction the beam had been and watched a thin thread of reality bend in front of her. Her anti-magic test was conclusive. Definitely the skeleton's doing.
"Best course of action..." She kept muttering while walking back to the bridge. "Either way, I should try it now. Yes, let's try it now. Come on, me!"
Her hands slapped the badger mask. She noticed it, removed it from her golem face and just dropped it on the wooden floor.
And I would need to make a new one. Great.
"Are you okay?" She heard the legged rapt ask. That fluffy monster had picked up the mask and was trying to give it back, but the forelegs could barely lift it off the ground.
She looked at the beast, then walked away.
After a bit of effort, the ship shook, broke from the dust and started to slide on the dry ground again. With that done she returned to the deck, to the patterns for the portal.
Clay hand up, trying to invoke it.
"Kaele."
I dropped my sewing once more. That was not how you opened a portal! Here! I raised my own human hand to let a tiny spot puncture reality.
"What?"
"Good, the portal still works. How is Nadjal?"
I was doing well, I had learned new thread techniques thank you, why would she care about the stupid bird monster?!
"Working on Hashal as requested."
"Good. Bring your necklace."
No. No I would not. But she wasn't giving me a choice. Through the synch, she was practically moving my body for me. So I watched myself get up and approach the portal, all the while taking off the beads and bringing one as close to the tiny magical puncture as possible.
She was approaching her finger on the other side. No matter how much I resisted, I could not stop it.
"Don't do it." I could not raise my voice, or the bird risked hearing me. "You know what it does."
"It absorbs mana. That's the point. Look at the number of beads."
"I don't! I don't want to."
"Your necklace works. It is the most insulated artifact we know of."
Okay no. It did not work and more importantly, even if it did, she could not... I looked through her at her pendant. The amber diamond fixed in it. She was planning to use that to extract the mana back from the beads.
Wait. Could it work?
"I put my mana in there, then draw from it slowly." And hold that way for years.
"What if it doesn't... work?" I had to calm myself, to not shout.
A human body was surprisingly expressive, by the way. I didn't know I could make those faces.
"Then you will kill me. Now hold steady."
Not that I had a choice. The bead was practically touching the portal. She touched it from the other side. I could feel the amber shake between my fingers! She broke first and fell on the ship's floor.
"Ah!" She panted. "Are you kidding me?!"
It wasn't the pain. The feeling of having your life swallowed away. No, it was how the bead could not handle the tremendous amount of mana she still had.
But I was starting to see things from her end. In a manner of speaking. The longer she waited to do it, the less mana she would have in the end. Any hour she waited was potential months or years shaved off her remaining life.
"Again!" She clutched her hands into fists, got up and approached.
I didn't know what to do. Well, I didn't have a say but that aside... she was right. If it worked, which was a big if, she would have found the loophole in the realm's mana drain.
And I really wanted for her to be right.
But there was nothing to be done. Even dampened by the portal's depth, her potency was still putting too much of a strain on my measly necklace.
She walked back to put her head against the main mast.
"Come on! The math is sound, why are you always doing this to me world!"
I watched her slide down and hit her head in a slow, beaten rhythm. A part of me imagined her weeks from now and could not gut it.
And there was nothing I could do.
"No, it just means..." She started, only to be cut off.
"Help! Help!" The fluffy monster was panicking.
She looked at it, then looked to the ship's bow and past. A colossal figure was bending the landscape, distorting it. A mass of bones the size of a large siege tower.
No time to reach the bridge, but the human-now-golem had my knowledge. She touched the mast, steered through the wood, had the ship turn hard and stop.
The towering skeleton had its only leg put in front of its skull. It meant it wanted to talk.
"Quick! Run!" The rapt pressed her but she ignored it.
In front of it the large monster stood silent, lowered its wing a moment before putting it back up.
"We meet once more, friend. I see your ingenuity to trick humans knows no end. Tell me, how does it feel to let the lamb rot before the slaughterhouse?"
"That red beam, that was you right?"
"Now, now," the creature put an emphasis on the next word, "friend, there should be no quarrel between us. We enjoy human demise just as much! A question for a question, would that not be fair? You answer me, I answer you, and our relation doesn't strain any further."
"I already know the answer. I even know how you found and used so much mana." The golem was tense. "What I want to know is what you used it on."
And then, she pretended to be calmer: "As for you, you are not really interested in my tastes, are you? Why are you here, so fortuitously in the middle of a desert? What a coincidence that we meet so soon after your feat."
Way to deflect. She could have told him it felt great, to be in control of everything, like holding the realm in your hands. It would have loved to hear that.
I would have hated to say it. So I was a bit proud of her.
The beast, for its part, looked neither amused nor upset. It only stood silent for a moment.
"Very well, good friend. Let me tell you of human warfare. Say magic is plentiful, what armor would you wish for? One that is immune to high magic. With this, the strong is even stronger. But under the drake's gift, that protection is useless. So what becomes the best defense?"
"One immune to low magic."
"But who would use such devious craft?"
"Humans trying to hide."
The skeleton started to laugh.
"And so it seems you knew that answer as well! I will soon deprive you of your livestock. Until then, enjoy your toys to the fullest. Make them dance, make them cheer, make them cry with the delectable knowledge that their squirming is futile."
"Alright then." She cut him off. "What's your question?"
"I know you intend to meet Veleter."
Just pronouncing that name made the skeleton's rage flare.
"That accursed worm knows the humans' hideout! Their defenses, their whereabouts! It would rather cower in its desolate den than share this coveted knowledge! One would even entertain the unthinkable and suspect him of being amicable to the wretched."
I was listening with bated breath. Literally with bated breath, for once.
The idea that the human refuge was still in the realm, for however obvious it sounded, still hadn't sinked in my head. The thought of a monster knowing where to find that last shelter only filled me with dread.
"He won't tell me, but, good friend, he may tell you." The skeleton started to stand. It would soon crumble to dust. "Cater to him, work your magic, fetch his secrets and I will offer you a feast like no other."
As its skull started to crack, it waited for a reaction, got none.
"Ponder all you must, good friend. Until then, keep squeezing your preys." Its voice was fading rapidly. "When it comes to cracking the humans' fortress, one never has enough mana. Stay well."
And the monster was gone.