Into the Abyss

What was interesting is that there were all sorts of links to all sorts of things. All the wizards that had demons with them, and to be fair there were not that many, had links to their demons similar to the one he had to Lenamare. There were also links between individuals; some between men and women were very light and clear. He wasn’t sure what those were; but the couples that had them were very clearly couples; some of them behaving like stereotypical married couples.

The wizards also had links/tethers to various items they possessed. Not all items, typically amulets and staffs. Some amulets then seemed to have more links radiating off of them to ‘somewhere else’ fading into the background unless he tried hard to trace them. Which he could do, at least until they went through a wall or out of sight.

He spent quite a bit of time looking at mana and animus distributions. Whatever this animus was, it wasn’t quite so clear. He believed it was this golden stuff enmeshed inside the people and their auras. Most of a person’s aura was mana related in some manner; or so he thought, but it wasn’t really clear. Maelen could answer that; except he had no idea how to ask because that was stuff any Animage should already know.

One thing that was clear is that some people ‘glowed’ more than others. These may or may not have been people that were more powerful. In fact, he was thinking they might not be. People whom he could tell by their clothing, demeanor and entourage were higher ranking wizards seemed to keep their mana more tightly concentrated inside themselves.

He spent considerable time thinking about how one could make these links. He’d like to practice. It would be rather convenient to have a link to Rupert to know where he was and if he was in trouble. Edwyrd did have some concerns about the ethical nature of these links, but having one to Rupert, who was supposed to be his son, would seem like a reasonable thing. Maybe Rupert would let him practice on him tonight?

Edwyrd also studied his own body, as much as he could. He was glowing, a lot, and while huge, it was sort of like a big cloud all around him. He supposed, since more experienced people reigned in their mana, he probably should to. It would keep him from sticking out like a sore thumb.

Later in the afternoon, he headed back to his room to get to a quite space so he could practice concentrating his mana. He’d done some meditation for Tae-Kwon-Do, so he thought he’d try that and imagine sort of sucking his mana inside his Edwyrd body, sort of how he sucked the giant Tom body inside. It seemed to Edwyrd, that containing mana would have to be similar to containing a giant demon form that kept wanting to burst out of him like a car’s front-impact airbag.

He had rather lost track of time working on containing his mana, when Tizzy and Rupert returned to the room. “Hey Edwyrd, about ready for dinner?” Rupert asked.

“Sure.” Edwyrd only pretended to eat, but the company would be nice.

“Who we going to eat tonight?” Tizzy asked.

Edwyrd shook his head as Rupert grinned cheek to cheek. “No one, I think you do that just to try and get a response out of me.”

“Still seems to work, a bit.” Tizzy observed. “Should be a quite dinner what with all those wizards scurrying around.”

“Well we are under siege.” Edwyrd told him.

“Yeah, don’t know what they’re up to, but they got teams running around buying up all sorts of crazy stuff in town and heading off to the basement with it.” Tizzy told him.

“Well, good then. I really don’t want to have the Rod, or the Sky Fleet coming in here. So whatever it takes to keep them away, the better.”

“Yeah, don’t like the Rod. Very high and mighty. About the only thing they were ever good for was kicking Ramses off the plane. But even that only lasted a thousand years.”

Edwyrd perked up. “Ramses the Damned? The one Maelen and I have been talking about?” Tizzy shrugged. “A Time Warrior? Dresses in leather straps, wears two swords.”

Tizzy nodded, “Yep, same one. I disliked him then, he was a real pain. Good thing Exador had him killed, for a while at least.” Tizzy seemed to be getting bored and floated out into the hallway. “He built himself a nice place there in the Abyss after that. Funky looking demons and all.”

Edwyrd shook his head. Tizzy was a treasure trove of information, if only there was a way to get it out of him more consistently and on demand rather than as an odd after thought. At least now, Tizzy seemed to have confirmed that the Ramses running around here was the same one with the palace in the Abyss.

Rupert and Edwyrd headed to the cafeteria; Tizzy had drifted off somewhere, again. When they reached the cafeteria, Maelen and Gastropé were there, so after picking up their food, they sat down with them. They both confirmed that wizards from the palace were running all over town looking for various spell components, particularly rare elements and gems. Edwyrd told them of Tizzy’s confirmation of Ramses.