Everything was magic. Every object, every person, every single grain of dust. And thoughts and causality and time as well.
Nothing escaped the mana drain.
So we witnessed a new form of destruction. Here at the edge of a forever frozen dungeon, our ship could only witness the impossible that awaited all of us.
The human was least affected by that sight. He only understood what he saw and to him, everything looked esoteric anyway. Both monsters in our midst were more impressed. It looked to them like the biggest, most potent spell they had ever witnessed.
I, the clay golem, was purely terrified.
As in I could best tell how it worked and my stone tablet simply failed to process.
Luckily we had stopped soon enough. There was not even a slowdown in our case, for all I could tell. But the effect was not all that shook me to the core. It was what had possibly happened there. Those shards suggested a deflagration.
"We should leave." I sighed.
I had wasted everyone's time by coming here.
"Where to?" Asked the magnal.
That lizard was ever as pragmatic. But I really didn't know what to answer. Anywhere would do. I could not think of another safe place to go.
"What if we could still go in there?" The human proposed.
"We can't."
"I think we can." He insisted. "I am the moon guru. With that many mirrors, I could amplify its light and use it to shield you."
That... made no sense. Beyond the feasibility, I could take days to finish testing a containment sphere. Whatever he had in mind would never last that long.
Other than purpose, it was essentially beaming magic into the void. I did not want to imagine just how consuming that would be to let someone tread in there.
So, no.
"We have seen enough. Let's go."
He held me back. "We have seen nothing yet! We have made the trip, let's not waste it! And if it's time magic, don't you want to see what's in there?"
That... still made no sense. Yes on both count but still... still... I did want to see what had happened in there. And while it was not time magic, just a lack of magic altogether, it was indeed a new state. One that could help with the containment.
Another kind of vacuum, in short.
Now my golem mind was racing, weighing the risk and reward.
"How long can you hold?"
He smiled, already convinced I had ceded: "I too keep a few secrets! Don't worry, you will have plenty of time."
That meant the system. Whatever he had done with it probably gave him that confidence. But, point for him, he was likely going to use a ritual. That was less consuming.
So, risk one: the human would burn his mana. Risk two: the human could be attacked during the ritual. Even ravaged, this was still a dungeon. Risk three: if the human broke his ritual, I would be lost to time. Never having entered.
And that... was fine. It actually made perfect sense.
"Nasse, the armor."
It would be a short expedition. First, wards to protect the human and runes to help his ritual. While I did that, the magnal helped him equip his armor. The man's princess watched us prepare and kept asking what she could do to help.
Second, I would go in the dungeon and reach its core. Third, I would test the containment sphere on a lack of time. Just a minute, then come back. And if it worked, I could even make that minute last months.
Not that my body could hold for that long.
There was still one armor left for me. The last one, the magnal pointed out. I put on the badger helmet, turned back to the human who had kneeled and the rest of the crew.
"Nasse," and to the menilis, "you," to them both "protect the master at all cost. At all cost."
It probably sounded like I didn't want to be left stranded down there. But what I meant was, in case of danger, to break off his ritual.
Time to go.
The human started his ritual. I left his chant behind to approach the area without time. Above it the moon had appeared, in a vortex, and its light now impossibly reflected on the frozen mirrors. The moment I entered, I was glittering.
That path was conservative. The moonlight would only beam on the necessary mirrors to reach me. A cosmic eye on my person, to keep me moving. Any dark corner and I was finished.
Easy.
Above me floated the shards. Below opened a deep crater. What stood at the surface had only been the tip, not even a dome, probably a flat window. I could have just dropped but the moon would have lost track.
Without featherweight, impossible in such dead environment, the one path left was the dreamscape.
In short, entering the glass shards themselves.
A dreamscape was that: anything beyond the mirror was what we dreamt. As a golem, that would have put me in trouble, but those surfaces were frozen anyway. I would walk in the last memories of its previous inhabitants.
It wasn't my first time stepping into the past.
But what I found on the other side was beyond mundane. Broken galleries lit up by smaller shards on which the moonlight could reverberate. For a dream this looked disturbingly real.
Another portal, another such passage. Yes, it was hanging above the emptiness but otherwise it was just rocks and glass. When touching the surface I could see beyond it and distinguish the walls of that underground crater.
Was that part of the dream? It seemed that there were... caparaces.
I could not really tell from there. If those spots were indeed chitin shells then yes, those insects had probably been frozen in time. Maybe what I walked in was what those monsters dreamed of.
But even though it was likely anachronic, I couldn't help myself: where there were caparaces, there were records.
So I took a little detour and started to search. I would test the surface of a glass shard and guess where it would lead me next. More tunnels and broken hallways leading ever further into the depths.
Once more, I was in one of those natural galleries running in the emptiness. Far closer to the wall this time and from there, able to tell.
Yes, those were caparaces. And if they were from the old days, they looked an awful lot like those that survived in our decaying realm. Those insects bore broken shells and, even frozen, seemed to suffer immensely.
One... had just disappeared before my eyes.
But more importantly, here were the records. So, so many records. The wall was just covered in stelae. Thousands of them.
We said: The kingdom of Epir has fallen. You must let us in. The dungeon said: We endure. You are welcome.
We said: We were abandoned. Will you take us? The dungeon said: We endure. You are welcome.
We said: Is it true that you can survive the calamity? The dungeon said: We endure.
We will not fail the test of time.
The story was the same everywhere. Humans abandoned by their own, seeking their own answer to the mana drought. With the cities rapidly dying out, the most powerful left behind had taken shelter here and elsewhere.
Rationally, the more that came, the more mana would be consumed. There was an incentive to keep them out. If the desperate welcomed them, they had a motive.
Still, they had recorded every single last person that had shown up, their history, their whereabouts. Maybe those humans sought not so much to survive as to leave a trace of themselves behind, a library for those who would come after them.
Or they were just really, really egocentric.
I was going ever further down and feeling the moonlight weaken a bit. Maybe the distance, or maybe something was happening outside. Still, whatever it was, I would not turn back.
More records.
We said: The orchals are dying. We will be next. The dungeon said: We endure. The orchals are not important.
We said: How much mana is left? How many more will come? The dungeon said. We endure.
The realm is merciful.
No way. No way in hell. But here it was, duly recorded. The humans had occupied this dungeon hoping to turn it into an enduring shelter and even as everything fell around them, they had clung to the belief that the realm itself would save them.
The realm. The same realm that was devouring them. The second best of humanity had rationally declared that there would be a miracle.
Nope. No. I refused to believe that. It was written white on black but screw that, no.
Regardless, it seemed the shelter was genuine. They were not luring in people to siphon their mana. They truly, really believed they could outlast the stars.
I had reached the middle of the titanic hole. The outside light, frozen as everything else, could not reach there. And here was an aethereal platform leading right to its center, surrounded by more floating stelae.
Caparaces were frozen in place all around. Yet they moved. Rather, they disappeared to time as others appeared elsewhere. Just how little mana they had was beyond comprehension.
But I could already tell I was not alone in this hellscape after all.
We said: It is hopeless. This will be our tomb. The dungeon said: We endure. Time is on our side.
We said: May the realm take the Earth down with us. The dungeon said nothing.
The records confirmed it. There were creatures capable of surviving under extremely low mana environments. Creatures that, in fact, could only survive in such conditions.
Humans could not become that and, instead, has sought to stretch time over the littlest part of their essence. But even that proved too much and, like other places, their attempt backlashed. Countless humans now dreamed nothing for eternity.
I sat in the middle of the crater, on the aethereal platform. Without it, the moonlight would not even have reached here. This was the limit.
Time to try.
The sphere rapidly formed between my hands. It crackled, then stabilized. I once again felt the choking emptiness shaking my body but it had stabilized.
"Human." A faint, distant voice called.
"Veleter." I struggled to answer, my own voice erased by time.
Before me the worm appeared, formed by the legion of caparaces that did not move. The worm did not move so much as he just shifted position. But he was there. It was there. Defying the absence of time.
That it confused me for a human was anecdotal.
"So you are a void monster." Since my voice was useless, I had resorted to thoughts. "What is it you seek? It's not mana, that would destroy you, so what is it?"
Did it wish for the entire realm to be void?
"Calisle is here." The creature answered. "Tell him."
Behind me the timeless reality warped. I feared that it would break the moonlight beam but though it bent it, it could not cut it off.
The massive skull of the wyvern emerged, but already broken, shattered. It reeled in this environment. And through that pain, it still pressed forward, brought its only wing forth, no matter how cracked, and spoke.
"Here you are, worm, hiding from my wrath." He too had to resort to thoughts. "Do you think yourself powerful for cowering in such depths? And here you are, friend. Convening with the deluded. Why, this may be the only time the three of us meet. Let us do the most of that."
"Tell him." The void monster repeated.
"Yes, friend. Tell me. After all this time, you may finally be inclined to reveal the secrets of the humans' haven. Tell me, so we cut short this chase. You could not, after all this time, still pretend to be anything but the finest killer. Let us kill together, great friend! Tell me where they hide."
The moment I broke the sphere, this conversation would be over. But for all the questions I had, every second I spent here was taxing the human.
Wait. Breaking the sphere. The vacuum. The balance!
The humans were mad geniuses!
"Tell him." The void monster pressed.