“So, you really think I’m ready to lay a beatdown on a god? I dunno…” Aujyav seemed to have more faith in Faiz than the boy had in himself. The two of them were back on top of the tree, which definitely made reality less confusing for Faiz.

  The impaled man nodded, looking exceptionally calm as he gazed out at the verdant greenery below, “Yes. Any further preparation would be ineffective. I have faith.”

  “That’s…actually comforting to know,” Faiz’s shoulders loosened up as he sighed, “So how do I get there again? Wherever this supposed celestial being is hiding out.”

  “The Second’s Tephra is located at the center of this memory. All unsinking thoughts, lingering wills and fathomless malice, coalesced. It shall destroy this world, and you will return.”

  The thought of getting back to a less unstable reality was exciting; More exciting than that was the prospect of taking revenge on those two bumbling intriguers. Would they be afraid of Faiz now, with his new power? Even better if they were awed instead.

  “I’ve been wondering, where will you end up afterwards Aujyav? I know you said time passes at glacial rates here, but even so, it’s probably been like half a trillion years or something you were gone. You gonna set up a mage tower like most other fossils that age?”

  A conflicted hum of thought came from the man, the wrinkles on his brow deepening as he thought, “Your words hold true. Perhaps I shall wander the lands, compare what you describe to what I see. Perhaps I shall finally unseal myself, and hold the Convocation to account. None possible without your aid.” His eyes swept over Faiz, “You recall the way?”

  Faiz nodded and cleared his throat, puffing up his chest with (vainglorious) pride, “Hah, I’m the best at remembering stuff! I just gotta walk forward without any expectations and I’ll find myself where I need to be! Uh, why do I have to close my eyes though? I’m kinda worried I’ll walk right into a tree or off a cliff.”

  “Comprehending any facet of the deepest layer of a Regent’s mind will end you. There is safety only here at the outskirts or at the terminus. You will see the battlefield I fought in there. Whence I arrived here, I left many a sign. Use them for guidance.”

  “I understand! Any last minute advice, or..?”

  “The Tephra is incapable of higher order reasoning. It is incapable of calling forth the vast majority of the Regents former strength. Beware its shine, and if it manifests great discs, approach it as expeditiously as possible.”

  “Right, got it! So, should I leave now? I’m about ready, if you say so.” Despite his words, Faiz felt slightly reluctant to leap off of the tree, looking towards Aujyav with a hint of expectation-though for what exactly, he was unable to say.

  The taller man didn’t seem surprised at his reluctance, his eyes fixed silently on the horizon. The silence lasted for a moment stretched to infinity, before he spoke softly, “Faiz. You will not fail, me or yourself. Go.”

  And with that, the boy breathed in deeply before stepping off the crown of the boughs, at the impending ground. The wind rushed past, leaves scattering as his eyes screwed shut. When he opened them again, everything had changed.

  It took a bit of getting used to, shifting from falling to walking, all that momentum vanished into nothingness. Still, Faiz thought he’d managed to perfect the technique enough to where he wouldn’t just flop over paralyzed for minutes. He took a glance at his surroundings.

  He was in a forest again, but a different one this time. These woods weren’t particularly lovely, but certainly dark and impenetrably deep. Faiz also had no idea where he was, but that was to be expected given his only direction of intent had been ‘The Center’, not particularly accurate.

  It was a fortunate thing he could feel no exhaustion, because wading through the gnarled and brambly shrubbery required utmost patience and care from him. He half wished to shoot off a sigil and be done with this whole business, but he had to conserve energy if he wanted to kill that Tephra. Faiz finally broke through a particularly dense thicket of pricking thorns and

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  Found himself staring into milky white, dead eyes. (Set into a charmingly severed head)

  “AhhhUrgh, that stings…which genius impaled a skull here for everyone to gawk at?!”

  Faiz winced and got to his feet, ignoring the pain for a moment as he took a closer look at his new friend. It was a head alright, some deceased soul separated from the rest of their corpus and left hanging like a macabre ornament. ‘Is this what you meant by ‘signs’..? It sure is effective at signaling, though..?”

  He was distracted from his line of thought when, while trying to move again, he almost fell over from the intense wave of discomfort that erupted from his rear side. Right, he was probably pierced by dozens of sharp needles…though he was loathe to dip into his extremely limited supplies of that terrible tonic Aujyav gave him, bearing this continuous throbbing ache wasn’t wise either.

  Gulping down a vial, Faiz continued on the grisly trail left for him. Admittedly, not all of his eccentric guide’s trail markers were heads, there was a large proportion of torsos and limbs too! All in a pallid yet pristine state, though Faiz was mildly disappointed there were no arms or legs creepily pointing in the direction he should go.

  In the midst of questioning Aujyav’s bad tastes in decor, Faiz took one step too far and the world shifted slanting up

  “Whoa, a cave this time! But it’s a little drab…there’s not even any aesthetic horror pieces here.” He found himself in a tunnel of pinkish rock, with weird channels cut into the walls, and a watery (it billowed and wavered) light flowing from somewhere in the distance.

  Faiz cracked his knuckles; He was used to caves, spelunking was something of a necessity to navigate Shaiher’s understreets after all. He glanced back: Nothing but opaque darkness, with an ominous air to it. Was it billowing a little? Curious, it almost moved. Faiz idly called up a sigil-merely using them as light wasn’t so taxing-to the air, and it did penetrate a ways into the darkness, and he saw

  “-” Forget light, forget sight, Faiz immediately turned out his sigil and shut his eyes, blindly staggering towards the radiance he could feel surging against his skin, away from the absolutely nothing wrong at his back.

  He whistled cheerily, soft giggles leaving his mouth as he started walking faster, after all, he didn’t want to trip and be totally fine, did he? The channels in the rock were sharp, enough to cut into his fingers and palms as he used them to haul himself forward. Faiz didn’t mind, the pain was so sweet, it helped distract him from the lack of any noises that weren’t getting closer.

  There was a neat little fire in his lower body, maybe he was just a good athlete! “

  The radiance was all encompassing now, wrapped almost the whole way around him. Faiz was almost at the exit! The complete lack of anything currently behind him beside him touching him touching him was surely to thank for the boost in speed. He couldn’t keep his eyes shut any longer, and making sure he was tipping off the edge, they opened. Sweet light filled his eyes, even as he caught a final glimpse of the sides of the cave. He didn’t crane his head all the way back.

  He left absolutely nothing behind there, and there certainly wasn’t a large tear in the cloth at his back, certainly not caused by anything.“I’m out, haha…ha? Er, why am I laughing? Where…uh, where am I?”

  Faiz looked around, confused. The last thing he remembered was…him about to light a sigil up, and the sense he shouldn’t think more about it. He did remember the writings…of…something? The thought made him feel greater dread, so he didn’t question that either.

  “I think I’m here, though! Is that the battlefield?” He was in a darkened overlook, hanging above a radiant plain, many small figures clashing everywhere his gaze turned, lots of light and Arts. Oh, it was massive in size, the war. Forget a few dozen, he swore he saw a few thousand people of all species and kinds beating each other to pulp. “And where is my target? Let’s see..”

  Faiz didn’t have to scrutinize the large array of combatants for long, an eye-searing beam of light in the distance caught his attention, and probably the focus of anyone who was fighting down there too. A figure swathed in oppressive, dominant haze, beating back at least a dozen individuals at once.

  As Faiz watched on slack jawed, a wave of achromatic intensity flared out from the distant figure, vaporizing an entire swathe of the melee. “This? -” He stopped and shook his head, “No, I have to do this, one way or another. I just hope it can't pull that move again and again...Alright Tephra of the Regent…here I come!”