Day 106, 4:10 AM

  Hundreds of drums beat in the darkness. The sound of rain battering at the roof and gushing through the drains is reassuring and intimately familiar after the years I’ve spent in this room. My chest feels tight, air entering my lungs with difficulty.

  I’m alive, the thought comes unbidden, and I recall crawling through the mud, worming my way forward.

  “Inquisitors!” I shout sitting up.

  Lucy jumps back, startled. She was holding my hand in my brightly lit bedroom, but released it as I jerked upright. I play oblivious, wiping cold sweat from my brow. Edna either regrew or reattached the limb. Suddenly, the crack from when she snapped my spine back in place echoes in my ears, as if she’s still fixing it.

  I draw a deep breath. There is no tightness to my chest, the sensation is a figment, an illusion or a disturbing memory of my once-ruined organs.

  After doing a quick mental check of my body, I focus on Lucy.

  “Thank you for watching over me, Lucy. Could you call Edna and Gila, we need to discuss certain matters.”

  “I’m glad you’re all right,” she whispers gently before turning around and leaving the room.

  Inquisitors… Tamed abominations… Wormlords are a class evolution of mages who merged two types of bugs. Can an inquisitor become a wormlord?

  Dozens of questions and theories swim through my mind, some sink as impossible or absurd while I explore the ones still floating, following vast and convoluted fleets of thought.

  “It’s good to see you awake,” Edna says instead of a greeting as she opens the door.

  Gila and Lucy follow her inside. Both girls are bags of nerves, but they show it differently. Gila’s gaze darts around. Probably her overcrowded family home having something to do with seeking outside threats when she’s on edge. Lucy is much more subdued. She’s gripping her left hand in her right, her lips pressed tight. I wonder what’s passing through her mind.

  Unlike the girls expecting disaster, Edna is smooth and relaxed. She even appears happy.

  “Now that was an unexpected turn of events.” Her lips stretch, revealing a predatory grin. “So, the inquisitors could control abominations all along, and our effort to waylay them in the corrupted lands helped them gather troops instead.”

  She locks her gaze on me, but I remain silent.

  “What do you think?” she breaks the silence before it brews into something more uncomfortable.

  “I think they will send a hundred or more inquisitors next time, and we have some forty to sixty days to prepare.”

  She arches her brow. “No comment on how they commanded abominations? You’re not surprised?”

  “I entertained various thoughts before, including the inquisition serving the wormlords, so no, I’m not surprised. What I am interested in is how do we defeat them? Should we wage war on the church? How many people do we need and what kind of resources? Do they have secret members or spies? How large is the organization? How many abominations can they command, and why haven’t they overrun the world already? What chances do you think we have?”

  Edna doesn’t answer the questions, and I hesitate before uttering the next. “How much would your power grow if you became an archmage?”

  The question elicits a twitch and a narrowing of her pupils.

  “Not much, maybe not at all. Legends say that becoming an archmage transformed the mage, but there are no documents supporting the claim. Best treat it as getting a new class.” Her piercing eyes stab at me, stripping the meat and gazing into the soul.

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  Redo isn’t red.

  Hardly a comforting thought.

  “I have found Hadriuse’s journals. One of them has a hint about becoming an archmage. Are you interested in seeing them?”

  Her eyes narrow further. “How?”

  I can sense the magic pressing at me, forcing me to speak the truth. It’s weak, and I could resist it, but I suffer the spell. My timing is wrong, awfully suspicious, so by letting the spell force me to speak the truth I will ease some of Edna’s worries.

  “I was interested in runes and examined the ones in the master bedroom. The nightstand proved fascinating and I found an oddity about it, which led to the discovery of the journals. I have sealed the secret compartment and wanted to discuss it with you later, and ask your permission to explore the house for other hidden chambers. Remember when I asked about grimoires?”

  She nods slowly.

  “I believe Hadriuse’s grimoires are hidden in some secret room somewhere, but finding them might take years.” I smile. “I know you are maintaining a spell on me. I wish you nothing ill as long as you don’t betray me, but should you betray me, you will die without knowing how or why.”

  While the girls go pale, Edna’s overconfident, she doesn’t see my statement as a threat, but she has no idea how lethal I am. Nevertheless, I continue.

  “We should, all four of us, be partners in this venture. We have some months yet until an army of inquisitors searches for their missing friends and finds us here. It would be best for us to spend those months trying to become as strong as possible.”

  Edna gazes at me and nods, the girls, however, are terrified. I have no idea how I defeated thirty men, and the feat cost me an arm and a spine. A hundred of them would slay me without losing half their number.

  I explain to Edna how to find the journals, and not to do anything until we discuss what she thinks of the entry describing how Honorable Hadriuse had become an archmage.

  “How are you two girls doing?” I shift my attention from Edna to Lucy and Gila as Edna leaves. I can only hope she’s a responsible woman who won’t run into the jungle to become a wormlord again. “I once more apologize for dragging you into this, I know you didn’t want to be heroes or fight a huge evil organization, but life had different plans.”

  Gila’s anger simmers, clear in her eyes, while Lucy forces a smile.

  “It’s not your fault, and we might have died in the dungeon had we not met you, and we certainly wouldn’t have learned magic if not for you.” She’s embarrassed and looks down. We chat a bit about their progress and how far along they are with learning fifty spells they need to reach level seven. Lucy caught up and overtook Gila, thirty-two to twenty-nine spells.

  Fortunately, Edna is a responsible woman, much more mature than me, at least in certain aspects, and she returns to discuss the entries she has read.

  The girls leave us to our esoteric topic while Edna discusses the magical implications.

  “I just need to merge two bugs into a single creature, and that’s it,” she says eventually.

  Her conclusion is a sensible one, same as mine was, the problem is that it’s the wrong conclusion.

  I straighten in my seat. “What would you call the creature you would end up making, Edna?”

  “An abomination,” she says and frowns, glaring at me. “You think mages created wormlords and abominations?”

  I shrug. “It’s not impossible. But let us ignore the topic for now; I have found the entries for the animals mentioned in the journal, thriller and belly-dragger. I think the key to successful advance is to join two vastly different creatures, like a spider and a fish.”

  Edna leans back in her chair.

  “That’s much more difficult to achieve and requires more finesse and more mana. I don’t even know if I can do it without fully exhausting myself.”

  Her words give me hope that Hadriuse wasn’t lying in his journal.

  “Tell me, Edna, do you think the act which would introduce you into the archmage class would be difficult, exhausting, and delicate, or easy and routine.”

  She nods slowly.

  “That makes sense. What’s the harm in trying to meld two bugs first to see what happens?”

  She’s asking all the questions I expected her to, and hours spent considering and running this conversation in my head are finally paying dividends.

  “So, your idea is to try, while wanting to no longer be a mage, right?” She nods. “And what will happen if you become a bug veterinarian, or some other stupid class and lose access to magic.”

  Edna shudders. “A fair point, we’ll do it your way.”

  Good thing I know Edna well enough, but maybe even Lucy or Gila could guess her phobia of losing access to magic.

  “Do you want to do it now?” I offer, and once more Edna’s giddiness surfaces.

  “The estate used to have several artificial streams and ponds. We can probably find fish there.”

  A part of me almost asked what if they dried up, but nothing dries up on Everrain, it only gets wetter.

  We head out again and explore the jungle. My scanner is set to thirty yards and the amount of input I’m getting puts the dungeon to shame. The artificial cave cannot compare with the amount of life in a real ecosystem.

  As we walk deeper into the jungle, I cremate the nearby threats, an orb-weaver hiding in the canopy, a pair of giant stick insects, and an abominable praying mantis. Edna uses the paralysis spell to bring down a tarantula, and I haul it with us. We reach a large pond after several minutes of walking, and soon we will see whether I’m right, or if I have another redo in store.