Kiri sat on the edge of the bed in the Den of Desire, the two women before her nodding eagerly.

  “You’re sure?” she asked Florence.

  “I am,” the woman responded. “He was gloating about it. How they had dragged the Enchanter out of his bed and onto the University grounds. He kept talking about how nice they were, with all the green grass and the trees. I remember because he kept calling it paradise and then talking about the sorts of things we could do in the shade of the trees.”

  Kiri tapped her lips in thought. The information would be useful for Luc and Nate, but without knowing what the Enchanter had been forced to do, she wasn’t sure how much it could help them. She would leave such thoughts up to the pair. She had no idea how enchanting worked beyond a surface-level, anyway, and even less about spatial magics.

  “Good work,” Kiri acknowledged, handing Florence a full mana-gem. “Anything else?”

  “No, ma’am,” answered her other spy in the Den. “I’ve been doing as you asked and focusing my attention on the guards and adventurers. None of them have said anything interesting. They complain about the people of the slums hiding things from them and about merchants and their families going missing, but nothing specific and about no one important.”

  Kiri nodded and handed her a mana-gem as well before taking her leave. Nate had given her plenty of mana for bribes or anything else and she had been putting it to work for the last week. The Pit had been closed down and she had spent two days trying to track down the fat bastard she used to work with in the fighting pit without much luck. She had wanted to start raiding some of the empty Noble villas to see if anything had been missed but Deverell had talked her out of it. The Nobles’ District was the most heavily patrolled by the strongest guards. While Kiri was confident she could win or escape any battle she was drawn into, Deverell had convinced her that the game they were currently playing was one of information and disinformation. Her fighting style was notable enough that, if anyone survived, word would get around and eventually back to Allais. If that happened, she would know Kiri was in the City, and if Kiri was in the City so was Nate and almost certainly Aisling. So, for now, she needed to keep her activities hidden.

  To that end, most of her evenings were spent surveilling the Adventurer’s Guild. She had wanted to handle the Royal University, and hopefully get eyes on Britt, for Nate’s sake. Again, Deverell had convinced her otherwise. The Guild had no soul energy users that could match her and so were unlikely to detect her watching since she was making liberal use of Soul Concealment. The same would not be true at the Royal University and while she thought she was probably still stronger, any risk was too much risk as far as Deverell was concerned.

  Returning to her hidey-hole in the roof of a building across the street from the Guild, she pulled the two runecrafted items Nate had given her from her Empowered Soul Sanctuary. After her first couple of days of complaining, Nate had spent some time coming up with these items for her. She said spent some time, but she was pretty sure it had taken him less than an hour. Previously all she could really do was faintly see people moving in the windows and try to count the numbers of Adventurers that came and left the Guild compound. However, these two items gave her far more options. The first was a piece of thick clear glass. Around the edges were rune carvings but what they did was simple, at least as Nate put it. The glass magnified the light that came through it, which let Kiri actually see the people in the windows.

  The second item looked a lot like one of Nate’s antiscrying wards but, in fact, did the exact opposite. It was connected to the magnifying glass and would try and copy the sounds around whatever she looked at through the glass. It didn’t work on anyone inside of the Guild building. The wards on the building seemed to prevent any sound from escaping. But it worked perfectly well on anyone in the inns scattered around the Guild compound, the guards at the gates and, of course, the training grounds.

  By listening to those conversations, it had quickly become apparent that Allais had a stranglehold on the information flowing through the Guild. Many had not been present on the night when Allais seized control of the Etruan Branch. The comments were often about how they couldn’t believe Prefect Porter had betrayed them and that they were either thankful they hadn’t been present or the complete opposite, instead boasting that if they had been present they would have cut down most of the traitors on their own. Either way, it seemed that turning many of the Guild members against Allais would be challenging at best.

  Kiri sighed at the thought as she got comfortable, settling in as the sun was just starting to rise. Another day of listening to the trials and tribulations of Guild members. Maybe today would be the day she learned something useful, but she doubted it. Deverell said that intelligence gathering was all about patience, something Kiri was working on developing. In the end, though, she was glad of one thing: she hadn’t seen Coralie. Maybe her ex-girlfriend had finally learned from her mistakes and fled her Mother’s clutches. The alternative possibility didn’t warrant consideration.

  *************

  Arikanvil appeared, to walk casually through the treasure room. It was here, he was sure of it. X’valia’severen, a True Divine, had boasted about it centuries ago before claiming to give it as a reward to one of his own Heralds, a Greater Divine that went by the name of The Hammer that Forged a World. The Divines raised in the Inner Universes often took upon themselves weird names like that. As far as Arikanvil knew, everyone just called the man Worldhammer. None of that really mattered to Arikanvil, though. To these Divines he was, and always would be, an outsider. How could he not be—he’d stolen things from almost all of them to fuel his rise to power. That was the power of a Wanderer. What were locks, keys, wards and even Divine realms to someone who could wander anywhere in space. Few and far between were the places that he could not tread if he so desired and the individuals who built those spaces had fueled their own rise to Divinity by offering their services to those who wished to keep Arikanvil out. This treasury was not such a location.

  Looking at the obscene wealth arrayed around him he ground his teeth together and once more cursed The System. Were it up to him, all of this would already be his, taken with a wave of his hand as he made his exit. But he couldn’t, tied down by a binding he had never asked for, kept from being who and what he was meant to be. The owner of the treasury was a Greater Divinity, and as a True Divinity, stealing from Worldhammer would be a violation of reciprocity. But confirming that the item he desired was here was not.

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  He debated using his Space is Mine but a twinge inside warned him that The System would consider even breaking into the various display cases a violation of reciprocity. He continued to move around the gigantic vault, ignoring piles of processed mana-gems that stood high enough to be considered small hills, walking past Purple Phoenix Feathers that burned with a fell light, scoffing at a small black and brown ball that he suspected was the heart of a Lesser Divine demon and restraining his urge to scoop up the sparkling sand that could only be a tiny portion of remains from a True Dragon. Seeing such a resource present in the vault of Worldhammer proved a truth he had already suspected: Worldhammer was the guardian of his True Divine Master, X’valia’severen’s, treasures. Every piece of sand that had once belonged to a True Dragon would have contained a touch upon the Divine. The iridescence indicated it had potentially been a master of Illusion, but there were other rarer possibilities. Without getting inside of the containment device, he couldn’t tell and he couldn’t do that without violating reciprocity, so with one last greed-filled glance at the sand, he continued his search for his true goal.

  Finally, after hours of walking through the expansive treasury, he found what he was looking for. The glass cage was lined with strips of iridescent purple scales that could only have come from some Divine monster that utilised the Concept of Void. That Concept had been built into the glass cage, separating the space inside from out, which was the only thing keeping the existence inside from escaping. The Spatial Spirit appeared to be a Lesser Divine, as it fuzzed around the edges, constantly changing shape. One moment it filled its cage, the next it was smaller than a fly, buzzing around the expanse, but always held within.

  Arikanvil tried not to sneer. He could see the parallels between himself and the Spatial Spirit; even if his cage was significantly bigger, it was a cage nonetheless. Still, he had confirmed it existed. The Spatial Spirit contained a touch of Divine Energy that could be used for any number of creations, but there was only one Arikanvil had in mind and for that, lesser materials would not do.

  A resource this rare and sought after was beyond Worldhammer’s means, and Arikanvil suspected Worldhammer’s master, X’valia’severen, had given it to Worldhammer to abuse one of the System's many loopholes. The reward had likely been deserved, but it was stretchable, and Worldhammer would no doubt trade it back to his Master the moment he was asked. But being held here, in the vault of a Greater Divine, meant it could not be taken by True Divines like Arikanvil and X’valia’severen. Worldhammer himself was no pushover. A clever ploy by X’valia’severen, but Arikanvil had his own plans to get around the limitation. After all, what was the point of having Heralds if you didn’t put them to use. He just needed to recruit a new one, someone not known to be connected to him. Or perhaps, two?

  *************

  Bordain ground his teeth as he stared over the battlefield. He reached inside himself, searching for that whisper, the voice of the universe that reminded him that power was everything and that he was one of the powerful. The voice was silent, and he knew why. He was losing ground.

  Fewer Nobles than he had expected had answered his call. He had expected at least ten to send both forces and Platinums to join his Second Army, under his direct command. Instead, he had received six and all those were ones who had family that he held captive in the Etruan Capital. Any other outlying Nobles and the two Ducal Houses, Korinth and Pleras, had ignored his call. The remaining Ducal House, Desmarais, had at least answered, the Duke himself coming. The Storm Mage was one of two reasons Bordain had not been forced to retreat. The other stood by his side, eyes downcast as she refused to look at him after her abject failure. Topaz was back in fighting condition and between the three of them they had held against what Bordain was finally forced to accept was a stronger force.

  “How many conscripts remain?” demanded Bordain of the Second Sword waiting behind him.

  “Less than two thousand, your Highness,” replied the man. “Enough for two more full assaults at the current rate of loss.”

  Bordain wanted to snarl. This was not how it was supposed to happen. His Skills let him fight multiple Platinums at once, especially against forces like Asmuisil, where he could target their empowerment arrays. Or that had previously been the case. They had somehow reacted to his first encounter with their armies by producing a new barrier array to protect the weaklings channelling their combined might into the array. If he could just attack the barrier directly, he would already be victorious. But instead, they sent three of their Champions against him each time he took to the field — too many for him to also spend some of his energy and focus on the barrier and so it held against his assaults. Topaz and Duke Desmarais had been faced with similar issues. So he was forced to consider his options.

  His Platinums were outnumbered twelve to eight, including himself. His conscripts had failed to find any success attacking the improved barrier arrays and he was bleeding troops and mana with no sign of reinforcements. It was to either bring more of his gems to the front, weakening his position in the Capital, or to retreat. The latter would be a mark against his rule and likely drive more of the Noble Houses into his sister's open arms. His anger bled out of him creating a palpable aura and Topaz let out a whimper beside him.

  With a vicious growl, he looked at the short woman, his most prized assassin until recently. Until her failure looked ready to cost him everything he had spent half a decade planning and preparing.

  “Send for Obsidian, Garnet and Duchess Desmarais. Malachite will have to hold the city alone.”

  Topaz nodded quickly, her short blonde hair matted with sweat, “As you command.”

  He ignored her as she stepped away to contact the Capital, turning his eyes to Duke Desmarais who puffed out his chest.

  “With my wife present and your own forces, we’ll rout these bastards. I assume, given the state of things and my House’s ongoing support, that we can expect commensurate rewards for our loyalty and assistance, your Highness?” wheedled the man.

  Bordain flicked dark eyes to look down at the Duke and the man veritably withered beneath his gaze. The silence dragged on and Bordain let it continue until he felt the man was suitably cowed before looking back over the battlefield at the invading army.

  “When this is over and I have dealt with the traitors who refused to answer the call, you can have half of House Pleras’ lands. Dungeons included.”

  Bordain ignored the greedy smile on the fool's face. He had a war to win and then a rule to cement. Then…and only then, would he get rid of the chaff, turning Etrua into the lean and deadly beast it should have always been. After, he would grow his Empire, spreading across the lands as he returned the mana flows to those who deserved them. Because only the strong deserved to have power and if that meant he needed to cleanse this world of parasites, then so be it.

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