Jason didn’t o fly around in a sphere or have Shade turn into a vehicle to get around his realm. But after years of being what amouo a disembodied spirit in ndscapes that were more metaphor thay, he was enjoying the feeling of limitation. And, by alerting Carlos of his approach, the priest had the ce to prepare for a he’d been w towards for more than fifteen years.

  Carlos had been dug his researside Jason’s soul realm because here the fual rules of reality could be altered. Pain, damage, eveh itself could be suspended. He had been using that cheat to advance his resear ways that would otherwise be illegal, uhical ahal. But, while Jason’s avatars had been helping, making those ges at his dire, there was only so much his avatars could do without Jason’s diretervention. But now, with Jason’s return the big step cold be taken.

  Now that Jason was no longer distracted, he could give his full attention and focus to Carlos and his work. He let Shade glide him over the streets of Arbour as a bck skimmer. The roads were colles of rocks set out in wide pathways, less surfaces to drive on than navigation aids for the winding routes through the tree city.

  The current residents were all high-rankers who could provide their own — usually flying — transportation. For the future, rge structs of living wood were scattered throughout the city. Shaped like buses, but on legs instead of wheels, they would provide a public transportation system, not just able to navigate the roads but also climb the rger trees of the very vertical city. While inactive, as they were now, they could sink their root-legs into the ground to absorb nutrients, or climb high into the trees for more sunlight.

  Shade’s bck skimmer was free of colour. Allowing and Gordon to influehe vehicle would add defensive properties, but in Jason’s astral kingdom, the greatest threat was something they could not guard against: a ky shadow familiar.

  The vehicle slowed to a stop at a rge stone building, set on the grouween a trio of massive trees. A group came out to greet Jason, prised of Carlos, Cassin Amouz and one of Jason’s avatars.

  Cassin Amouz had arrived within hours of Carlos giving a letter to the desk attendant in Rexion, stationed outside the portal to Jason’s kingdom. A portal courier saw that the letter reached Rimaros with haste and another portal brought Cassin to Yaresh. His gold-rank speed allowed him to reach the shaft and desd with swiftness, now that it was rgely safe.

  Cassin was heavily ied in Carlos’ research, both literally and figuratively. He had poured the siderable wealth of his family into it, in hope of saving his son. Gibson Amouz had been held in magical stasis for years, and even then might have passed away without Jason’s realm turning off death itself. He had been caught midway through an eborate corruption ritual by the inaptly named Order of Redeeming Light.

  Saving Gibson was Cassin’s goal, but for Carlos it was a first step. What they learned in doing so would hopefully lead t other dreadful afflis, beyond even the most powerful essence abilities. Cassin had provided every resourecessary for Carlos to save Gibson, and pledged to support his research perpetually if successful.

  The avatar melted in an instant and flowed through the air as a liquid of red, bck, blue and e. Jasoended a hand and it was absorbed into his body. Absorbed with it was the knowledge and memories the avatar had acquired in more than a decade as Carlos’ assistant. Jason blinked a few times as he processed everything the avatar had seen, done and learned w for Carlos.

  “You’ve been at this for a long time, Carlos, and I see from my avatar that you wasted none of it. I’m guessing you’d be happy to not stand on ceremony and just get to it?”

  Relief showed in Carlos’ entire body as a nervous tensio it. Rather than respond, the Healer priest turned a inside, waving at Jason to follow. What came after was lengthy and plicated. The interior of the building had a hospital’s sterility, nothing like the earthy sts and warm colours of the autumnal city outside. The operating theatre was filled with specialised tools, many developed by Carlos in the preg years. Dominating the room was a tank where Gibson Amouz was floating, upright and unscious.

  The inal research assistants were long gone, repced with a slew of pliant avatars. They didn’t even have Jason’s appearahe way the one he absorbed had, let alone any of his personality. These were simple dark figures, like bnd copies of Shade, but each bearing a single nebulous eye on their heads. Carlos liked them because they were precise, tireless and silent.

  The process of saving Gibson had more in on with surgical procedures of Earth than traditional Pallimustus ritual healing. Carlos had developed a method of causing all the tainted magi Gibson to physically ma, then cut it right out and off of his body.

  It was grim, visceral work, with Carlos, Jason and the avatars being painted in blood and gore. A gold-ranker might have survived the process, but only Jason eliminating the cept of death and pain allowed Gibson to make it through. Finally, the corrupting magic was excised and Carlos used more traditional magic to restore the boy’s savaged body.

  Cassin Amouz watched the entire process, hour after hour, with unfling resolution. When all was done, Carlos raest he could to determine Gibson’s dition. Deg there was nothi but to wait fibson to awaken, Carlos led Jason out, leaving Cassin with his son in a recovery room.

  Carlos and Jason staggered, exhausted, into crystal wash showers. They had burhrough and recovered astounding amounts of mana over seven hours of inteual magid painstaking pseudery. Eborate sigils carved into flesh with painstaking preana carefully elled through devices designed and built by Carlos himself in his research.

  They stumbled out of the building in fresh clothes and fell onto a wooden ben front of the stone building. They took in the evening air, cool, fresh ahy. Even Jason’s prime avatar was strained by a sequence of interlog rituals more intense aehan anything he had done before. He did recover much faster than Carlos, however, drawing on the power of his kingdom.

  “This is just the beginning,” Carlos decred with weary satisfa.

  “I hope you learn a lot from this,” Jason told him.

  “I believe I will,” Carlos said. “I had every measuring tool that could even potentially useful in there, and a few I ied myself. But there is a long way to go. The step is refining the procedure. This crude butchery that relies on the local god to alter reality is an unsustainable approach.”

  “I’m not a god, Carlos.”

  “You suppressed the very cept of death.”

  “At most, I’ll accept god-adjat.”

  Carlos turo look at Jason.

  “You haven’t noticed, have you?”

  “Noticed what?”

  “How long have you been wearing that special avatar of yours?”

  “Well, that took about seven hours, so, eight or nine hours.”

  “I’ve worked with your avatars for a long time now, Jason. They are a bnd lot, for the most part, but I’ve bee familiar with the linguistic quirks they’ve ied from you. The way your transtion power haurning yuage into mihis new avatar isn’t speaking my nguage.”

  “It’s not?” Jason said, listening to his own voice. He’d bee so used to his mouth using myriad nguages it had bee background noise. When he trated now, what he heard was English.

  “You’re speaking a nguage that my mind says is mine, but isn’t. I have enough trol over my perception that it’s not my mind uanding you but my soul. It’s how gods sound.”

  “That’s not good. I mask my eyes now, so it’s easier to buy pies, but now you’re telling me voice is all weird?”

  “It’s not that it sounds different. If anything, you sound more natural than ever. I suspect that people are going to hear their own nguage from you, whatever nguage you use.”

  “Like when gods speak to people.”

  “Exactly. It’s like there’s a power infused into your words. Not aura, exactly, but something simir. I’m not sure how to describe—”

  “Authority,” Jason said. “I suspect the word you’re looking for is authority.”

  “Yes,” Carlos said, nodding. “That’s the word.”

  Jason shook his head.

  “That might be a problem,” he said. “I’ll have to see what I do about suppressing it, but it’s one more thing on the list at this stage. Training ops does it?”

  “Not if you’re doing it right,” Carlos said with a chuckle. The apparent success of his procedure after so many years of build up had transformed the tense man into a nguid puddle.

  “What now for you?” Jason asked. “Refining the procedure, obviously, but what’s the practical step?”

  “Assessing young Gibsoing as muformation as I from him. I o monitor his recovery closely and make sure it’s plete. As for the procedure, I have two goals. One is removing the relian you, and the other is having the procedure work on the fully verted, not just someone halfway through the process of corruption.”

  “How long until you’re fident of w on someone fully affected by the Order of Redeeming Light’s ritual?”

  “You’re thinking of Miss Wexler’s mother?”

  “All of them. While those we know matter to us, we have to keep sight of the wider implications. The greater good we aplish.”

  “I am gd you’re not short-sighted in this. While my goal is to escape relian your soul realm, it remains a valuable asset in the short term.”

  “You should know that I will be taking my astral kingdom away in a little while. I’ll be returning to my homeworld for a time, and I will need my prime avatar to open doorways to it.”

  “That wasn’t an issue before.”

  “The rules are different now. Very different. The portals I established before were to a hazy half-reality. This pce is only a pocket universe, but it is a universe, plete and whole.”

  “That is unfortunate.”

  “Possibly not. Much of what we did today was remi of how medie works oh, where I e from. I don’t imagihere will be a lot of direct crossover, but there might be a lot for you to learn there.”

  “You would take me?”

  “I io take a lot of people. Seeing aire other universe is a rare opportunity, perhaps especially so for you. My world has airely different medical paradigm, not to mention a very rge number of vampires. Your ultimate goal is a cure for vampirism, is it not?”

  “Lesser vampirism, yes. Those who have accepted it into their souls are beyond any intervention.”

  “I have some things to settle here, before I set out. But you work oher victims here while we travel. How long will it take for you to sider using this process on those fully affected by the Order of Redeeming Light’s influence?”

  “I do it soon, if they’re willing to accept a butcher job like this one. I want to use those procedures to make the process less aggressive.”

  “And therefore survivable outside my kingdom.”

  “Precisely. How long that takes depends on how much we get from today’s results. We o see how Gibsresses over the few weeks. I’ve been preparing for this for a long time, and I won’t squahis opportunity by rushing things now.”

  “Let’s try ahe Redeeming Light victims sorted out first, then. I have some things to do before I head for Earth, so you’ll have time to assess Gibson and decide if you want to join me. I gehink there are things for you to learn there and you’ve been w for so long, with so much focus. You could stand to clear your head.”

  “Arabelle keeps tellihe same thing.”

  “And she’s right. But I reise how important this work is. I want you to know how much I admire what you’re doing, and why you’re doing it. I’ve saved quite a lot of lives as an adventurer, but I’m famously the guy with the evil powers. I have one sing power, and even that kills my ehe only solutions I have to offer e in the form of violend horror. You’re doing something that will help people heal from some of the worst things that be doo a person.”

  “I’m a priest of the Healer. It’s my duty.”

  “Duty will take you far, Carlos, but this is well past that. I know you’ve been through some things. I don’t know what they are, but I’m sure they’re a part of what has made you so driven. That doesn’t ge the fact that you are doing something amazing here. Something good.”

  “Good enough that you’d put a temple of the Healer in the Brightheart city? Even before the portal shut, I wasn’t going to church very often. It was too far away for me to leave the work that long.”

  “Actually, Carlos, that’s already in the works. If it’s been a while, you might want to go say g’day to yod, though. He might think you’ve ghosted him.”

  “My god does not think I’ve abandoned him.”

  “I don’t know, mate. Someone doesn’t hear from you in a while, they start to wet insecure. Did something happen to Carlos? Is he alright? Has he been hanging out with ods? I knew I saw him looking at the temple of Lust, and he says he wasn’t, but I know what—”

  “With all due respect, Mr Asano, please go away.”

  “Fair enough.”

  Annou: Due to the release of Book 11 on Kindle Unlimited, chapters 791 - 882 will be removed from the site oh or 10th of July, depending on timezone.