8 ) Setting Limits [ You must be this old to enter the Dungeon ]

  While I was making a clever quip to Unity, inside my head, I was screaming so badly that Viola had been awoken from where she had been sleeping up against my Core. With a yell, she tried to leap to her feet, rammed her head into the bottom of the shelf that was above the one my Core sat on, and then tumbled over the edge of that same shelf before falling out of my Core’s sight with a yelp.

  Even when what I guess I would call my soul was in the Spirit world, I was still dimly aware of what could be seen from my actual Core back in the mortal world. Which was a little new. I think that I might have always been able to do that, I had just never paid all that much attention to what was happening in the Mortal world while I was trying to do things in the Spirit world.

  I guessed that the yelling and now cursing from the floor Fairy was enough to get my attention.

  But not enough, now, to completely derail a few thoughts that were racing through my mind.

  The book that had so interested the Goblin Tamer and pot thief, Nort, or whatever his name had been, that book had a hollow gap in the middle of it. A gap that was the same size as the Lexica resting in Unity’s hand.

  The same book that I had given him to get him to never bother me again.

  The Goblin, whose name I had forgotten not so much out of absentmindedness, but rather disdain, would be coming back looking for the ball.

  Soon. Very soon.

  I had so many other questions to ask my Liaison, but I thought that an enemy that could be coming after me, again, at any moment, was going to have to take priority.

  I needed to get out of the Tower and back to the Mortal world.

  Right now.

  “Unity!”

  The winged woman jumped a little on her stool. “Fell!”

  This story originates from Royal Road. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there.

  Why did she yell? I know why I yelled, but I have a reason to yell since I was in a hurry… Ah, yes. I am, in fact, in a hurry.

  “I need to Level up right now. What I was thinking about was some power to keep people out of my Domain-”

  Unity was already shaking her head. “That would be too powerful for a Rank one Fell, the best we can do is…” My Liaison paused to tap her fingertip against her lips. “The best we could do is weaken them.”

  That sounded good. Actually, it sounded pretty good… Ah, Pit! I had already made a deal to let those Adventures in.

  Not that I minded going back on my word with people who had been perfectly happy to break into my home. But I also wanted all the Cores they had promised me a payment for fighting my Summons.

  “Can… Can we do it so I can weaken anyone who doesn't have an invitation? And then either give or withdraw that invitation at any time?”

  Unity nodded slowly, then more eagerly. “Yes, I think we can do that. But before we Level you up to get that power, what about Viola? It would be a waste not to give her a chance to trade in another Flower Fairy power for a new Domain power.”

  Hrmmm. “Yes, I guess it would be.”

  I needed my Fairy to get something that would help keep me alive, and her as well. Just making her my Familiar had made it possible for me to Summon her back to life if she were killed. So, at least as long as I didn’t die, I had made her Immortal.

  At least in the can’t die way, not in a being a God sort of way.

  So what can we offer the Fairy now? Since it had to be something she would be willing to give up from her old position as the Guardian of a Domain made up of wild flowers and other vegetation somewhere off where there were no people. All in exchange for something that would help defend me.

  “Is there something that can go with the weakness that uninvited intruders get, something that will help her in a fight against them?”

  My liaison slowly nodded. “Viola already has a power to hide herself inside the Domain she’s assigned to, but we could make it more powerful against those already being affected by your power. Or at least we could offer it to her.”

  Spreading her hand along the top of her table to make a sheet of thin parchment appear, Unity plucked a light gray feather from her own wings to inscribe a message in lettering that burned in flames of all the colors at once.

  Finishing, the Liaison rolled up the message and tossed it into the air for a small whirlwind of silver metallic snowflakes to appear and sweep up the parchment inside of the spinning, sparking, cone of moving air before vanishing, along with the message.

  Unity looked towards my Core again. “Is there anything else Fell? I don’t want you hurting yourself again by trying to ask another question after you’ve accepted a new Level.”

  I mean, as far as I could tell, nothing seemed to be attacking my Domain in the Mortal world at the moment, at least according to a panicking Fairy racing around my Domain and checking each and every room in between, gleefully greeting each of the Summons that I had called up while she was sleeping.

  This was a quiet moment, I could get several quick questions answered… which would lead to more questions, and pondering of the answers… while I ignored everything happening back home until the threat was already in my library.

  No. “I’ll go with what we discussed Unity. Now send me back. Please and thank you.”

  With a nod from my Liaison, I found myself abruptly fully aware of my surroundings from my Core back in the Mortal world.

  And in the Spirit world, through my innate Summon’s eyes, I could see Unity standing up and walking around her desk to pick up the book lying on the floor.

  Flipping open the cover, Unity silently read the opening page, then flipped through a few more before pausing to read something with a nod of approval.

  “Oh, Helvetica. Registra would approve.”