Chapter 483 – Afterparty (Patreon)

Raaaah. I did some editing today. Victory.

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“I love killing mages. Damn near my favorite thing in the world. They act like just because I don’t understand what they can do, I can’t Cut them. Like because they know more of the rules than I do, they have some sort of advantage.

“And maybe they do. They certainly used to. But there’s a lovely, lovely power in simplifying their math. In making all of those fancy nothings into real nothings. A million different tricks, all the things that would break the world if let out of control, and they don’t even realize that at the end of the day, you only need one trick. If it’s good enough, it doesn’t have to be a trick at all.

“They’re the most annoying fuckers in the world to fight. But I just love the payoff. All that annoyance, bleeding right out of me as everything at all bleeds out of them. Mmh. Just lovely.”

–The Fourth Blade, thinking out loud to a room full of corpses-to-be who should know better than to have ears at the wrong time.

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The early dawn is always a joy for Raika. The distant horizon, slithering and writhing as countless hues of flame wriggle past it, congregating far past where the eye can see. The change to the sky, gradually painting itself in all new colors, removing the immediacy of the staring eyes from above and not yet graced with the beauty of glorious blue. Red, from crimson to maroon. Orange, from bloody to fruity, all the way into a brilliant, beatific yellow so pretty that it makes gold look dull. A signaling of the new day, wrapped up in colors that combine the brilliance of day with the darkness of night. 

She watches the sun rise, sipping a cup of terrible tea she loves so much, and enjoys the pre-dawn light. 

“You can come out now,” she says. “We’re alone. Enough, anyways.”

For a little while, the silence continues. No more than a minute or two, though. Not much longer than it would take for someone to get over the surprise of getting called out. 

Still, her visitor doesn’t let it phase them very much. 

“Damn. Tits out first thing in the morning, boss? Classy.”

“I’m nothing if not a beast of simple pleasures,” she sighs, taking another sip.

“I wouldn’t exactly call them simple. If what the cat’s told me is even a little bit true, you like to get it a little complicated indeed.”

Raika snorts. “I can’t speak as to Maen’s recollections, but I found it all quite self-explanatory.”

The empty space beside her laughs, a boisterous thing that somehow still keeps from touching the person sleeping inside her cabin. The presence shifts, yet does not touch a blade of grass or move the slightest bit of air. 

“So. You mentioned that the “big boy” was reaching out, at least a little while back. Anything too immediate?”

“Nah, if it was, I would'a let you know. Big scary bitch that you are, that fucker’s got plenty of threats of his own. He’s moving, though, him and that pretty little poisoner of his. And his corpse. And his mad scientist. Hell of a crew the fucker’s got. Suits him, though. He just gives off the energy of someone who does fucked up shit behind closed doors, and I hide behind way too many of those to feel safe around his big scary ass.”

Raika nods. “He is very much that type, yes. But he wouldn’t kill you if it doesn’t advantage him enough, and he wouldn’t try to break you unless he was sure you’d still be useful after. Considering I barely even understand how you’re useful now, and I know you pretty well, you’re safe enough. For now.”

“Love those caveats, boss. Super appreciate the vote of confidence.”

She huffs a little laugh, taking another sip. “Alright then. What brings you all this way, if not some emergency?”

“You’ve been a little radio silent, big girl. People are getting worried. I figured I’d come check in right quick. The pretty little princeling, my lovely little paramour, that squiggly little goblin of yours, everybody’s trying to make sure your shit isn’t turning to some kind of nightmare situation here in the front lines.”

“Ah. Well. Fair. And the other parts of me didn’t say anything?”

“I mean, you’d know better than I would. Right?”

The hesitation in his voice is real enough that she has to laugh. 

“Yeah. I know. Been giving me my privacy. Our privacy, I guess. Our own privacy. From ourselves.”

“And that’s… healthy?”

She laughs at that. “Yeah, actually. Much more than usual. But it just takes a touch, and I get updated on everything. Speaking of which… no, no, I haven’t been very clear about this space. I’m alright. The kids are adjusting pretty well. Better than I expected in some ways. I think the plan’s working. Getting a little bit of well-adjustment.”

“Hmm. Well alright then! Everybody’s got their own journey, right? If yours is working, good for you. And good for the kids? Funny you’re calling them kids. Pretty sure that musclehead is older than I am.”

“I thought you were in your thirties or something?” Raika asks.

Hao Nera snorts, both there and not. “Well I am. He’s like, forty or something, no?”

She laughs, out loud, loud enough that she has to check and see if anyone’s heard her. They haven’t, but she does school herself a bit nonetheless. 

“No, he just stresses the fuck out of himself. Premature aging and all that. I’m doing my best to fix it up, but it’s actually significantly easier to put in a new organ than to unmake the effects of perpetual stress. It actually affects… it affects everything. Top to bottom, and I’m still figuring out how to get down that deep.”

“Yeah, you would say that you size queen.”

That almost gets her volume control to slip up again, but she keeps herself to just a chuckle. “Fuck off. You always act like I’m the only freak in a given conversation, but I’ve heard the stories, alright? Li Shu gets descriptive when she’s had a few drinks.”

It’s his turn to laugh now. “Well, I can’t be teased about it is the difference. I’m nothing but proud of my depravities.”

She sighs. “Focus, please. Since we’re here; you update me, I update you.”

The impossible, nonexistent shadow gives a big old shrug, shaking not a single molecule of air as he does. 

“Sure. Uh… things are going pretty well overall. Plans progressing on schedule for the most part. The princeling’s got the near side of the Wall eating out of his palm last I heard, floating on that big fancy bomb of theirs. Your corpse-brother, that Martyr guy, he’s got the eastern front pretty locked down, but the rest of the Pack is running wild. For now, that’s working out helpful. More of them go north and south, more the other fortress cities have to hold onto their forces, keeps them from coming up that main breach. I hear that our “Prince Atop the Wall” has the Blades held back for now, but no clue if that’ll hold for more than another month or two. His letters are starting to get testy.”

She nods. “If Shin Ren says we need to move, then we need to move. Do we know where he is in his strength?”

“Politically? All time high. Personally? I think he’s kept it up, but I mostly got rumors there. You know how it is with sending specific information; no channel’s too secure. He mentioned something about new seats around the fire, and I don’t think he meant fresh recruits that time, so maybe.”

“Right. Fair enough. Any other players I should know about?”

Hao Nera, in spite of not being present, nods, taking a seat on the hillside of her cabin. 

“Well, the goblin says she’s got family now. Went over there to count and, well… I don’t really know numbers that high, and I had other shit to do. Maen’s got some pathways into the second ring now, so I’m making inroads to their cities, and we’ve got some sympathizers, some useful, some not. A few of the sects are ripe for a little manipulation, but don’t mind them. Me and the big bastard are working our magics. We’ll have the political angle covered. Your spouses are helping there, too. Some of them are having trouble, but not all those false identities have gone to waste. Hijacking the post office and the tax service at the same time was probably the hardest job I’ve ever done, and I broke into the side of the first goddamn ring, but their stories are fucking foolproof, it’s just the acting skills that sometimes slip.”

“That’s fair. So long as they’re having success overall, and aren’t being risked too badly?”

“It’s all risks, big lady. But yeah, I’m easing them into it, and we’ve got extractions in place should they need them. We’ve got a couple placed into the Academies, a few in some of the fancier sects, but only two have made it into the big six fanciest ones.” 

“Think that’ll be enough?”

He takes a flask out of his nonexistent robes, raising the nonexistent beverage to his lips. “We’ll fuckin see. You’re damn scary, but honestly, we’re lucky all these old fucks like taking their fucking time. Pretty much all the real heavy hitters are starting to move now, which is better than four years ago or whatever, but a lot is riding on your little republic, the big biters in the Pack, and… well, you. I’m good, and so is the big furry fucker, but I doubt anyone thinks we’re going to kill the Empire or whatever with a few spies and some political upheaval shit. It’s going to come down to force. Eventually, immortal superbeings are going to come down and crush everything I can build up, and they’ll have another thousand years to build it back up.”

Raika grunts. The eternal dilemma. Destroy the economy, cripple the industry, put every sect in the Empire into a state of revolt, it won’t matter. At the end of the day, if enough Warrior Realm experts move in, or the Division of War as a whole, or hells, one of the first ring’s real superweapons? None of that will matter. The Empire, like most of the world, is run by entities that can carve apart continents, don’t need to eat, to sleep, and don’t ever die unless they’re killed. 

They can make more mortals. They can make more land. They can make and wait for more resources to develop. The richest, the most powerful, are so divorced from the world and from the majority of all people that any plan that doesn’t address them head on will fall apart.

Would that it could all be done peacefully. Would that she could change the world without ever having to strike it, without acting in ways that would ripple out to places like West Laketown. 

Maybe it could, in another world. But in a world of monsters, all-powerful and divorced from all retribution or consequence or empathy, well. 

Some things need to be cut away before the flesh can heal. 

She has to be sharp enough for that. They all do.

“Which meeeeeans… maybe it’s time for you to update me,” Hao Nera says. 

She smiles softly. “In a moment. First, tell me about the ‘big furry fucker’.”

Hao Nera sighs. Long and deep. 

“Yeah. Alright.”

She takes another sip of the tea. Quiet. Slow. She gives space, as she’s gotten so good at doing with practice. It’s not often that Hao Nera’s mask slips, but when it does? She pays attention.

“He’s on edge. Really on edge. Him and that flower of his. They’re moving, but I mostly only see those moves from the ripples they make. And they’re big fucking ripples, but then he makes a different move and they fucking cancel out, go hidden. That fucker scares me. He’s been playing the same game I have, but with way bigger sharks and for way longer. I’m playing catch-up when it comes to him.”

“But you think he’ll keep his side of things?”

“If you’re asking if he’s actually going to turncoat when it’s time? Yeah. I’m fucking sure of it. He might still betray us if it means the Empire dies some other way, but the furry fucker hates the white and gold. Like, with a passion. If you’re asking if he’s going to back us up all the way? Fuck no. I’ve got good money riding on him double-crossing us so he can triple-cross someone later, and alright money on him doing a quadruple cross for someone totally new after that.”

“Right. Because you and gambling go so well together.”

“Gotta be more up to date about shit, boss lady. I figured out the trick to it. I only lose money when it’s funny. And ain’t shit fuck-all funny about Taurus.”

Raika nods, rolling her neck to pop it loudly. The sunrise is almost proper now, less of a pre-dawn light and more of a true dawn painting of the heavens. Still, she can’t help but wonder.

“You deal with sect-heads and monsters like me all the time. How does he measure up?”

Hao Nera sighs. Then he goes to say something. Then he sighs again instead.

“I… I don’t know. I’ve only been around him in person a few times, but it’s like… it’s like being underwater, right, and you’ve got a bubble, so there’s no water at all. But then you see a crack, and you realize how much pressure there is, and it’s just hiding behind the thing that’s keeping you alive. Sometimes he’s got the kind of presence that makes me think he could fuck up a city with one hand, but then I’ll blink and it’ll be like he’s in the Qi-Gathering Realm. I can barely even sense him sometimes.

“But that’s just him personally. Outside of that? He fucking scares me. The shit he does with a stylus and some ink? I’ve never seen arrays like his stuff. Ever. And he makes it fast, like on a piece of paper. Every time I’ve tried to look into any projects of his, the ones with real resources, real time and effort put in? The ones I can find, at least? They’re… I haven’t found anyone that can figure them out. Obviously I can’t just call up the Division of Research or Altered Cultivation or whatever, but I know people. I’ve got blackmail on motherfuckers, the kind where they’ll look at some designs for me happily, and they can’t make heads or tails of it.”

“Mmh.”

He shrugs, then shakes himself. His personality slips back on, the mask of a smile popping back up on his non-existent face.

“Sorry I don’t have anything better.”

She shakes her head. “No. I trust your instincts.”

He sighs. “Sure. It… hmm. He reminds me of you, sometimes. The way you just… do things, and I can never figure out how after the fact. Like you’ve figured out some kind of trick that no one else has found yet.”

She breathes in, low and slow. Then back out. Then in again. Then out. 

“Well. That’s a scary thought.”

“...yeah. I guess it is. What a lovely joy that it is that he’s on our side, right?”

She raises an eyebrow, to which Hao Nera lets out a chuckle. 

“Yeah, yeah. I’m hilarious, I know. You should really pay me for the entertainment.

“Speaking of tricks, though. How the hell did you even notice me? Update me, motherfucker.”

Another sip of tea, and then she rolls her arm, cracking a little bit of the joint in her shoulder, pupping some of her ribs as she does. 

“It’ll be easier if I just show you.”

So she does. 

With one hand, she pulls open the world, and wraps herself and the nowhere-man in the space just beyond it.