Territorial Authority Established!
You Have Claimed The Lost Territory of Nagast!
Welcome, Inheritor!
"Oh," he said, blinking his eyes. The pain and pressure, all of it was gone. "Oh."
A sense of what he'd just accessed filled his Mind, the borders of the once-Territory of Nagast shown clear against a map from another Age. It spread, from the Bitter Sea in the west and south, to the Hoarfrost in the north, all the way to
"Holy crap."
Felix could feel the breadth of it all, like a limb he hadn't known existed. Mountains and forests and swamps and rivers, vague impressions for the most part, but it was there, etched on an ancient map in his Mind. He could even feel the influence of the Spirit Tree on the Territory, like a balm.
Due To Reviving A Spirit Tree On The Brink Of Extinction
Authority Has Been Increased!
A large menu appeared, floating in mid-air and glowing with a golden radiance. Like in Naevis, there were several tabs and much of it was greyed out, but a few pieces caught his eye.
"Mana Relay? Offensive and Defensive Arrays? Is this what I think it is?" Felix asked his sword.
It certainly seems to be. II recall a similar display in my own Family's Holding. I think. Look there, under Defensive Arrays.
Felix toggled that tab, and a list of illegible symbols populated his screen, all of them greyed out. All except one.
Mirk Enclosure - Ritual, Defensive Array, Tier IV
Effect: Encase your Territory in an impenetrable fog, invisible to your people within, but a physical and sensory barrier to all those without.
Initial Cost: 10,000 Mana/5,000 Essence
"Ten thousand Mana? Jesus. Wait, does that mean Essence is twice as potent as Mana?" Felix asked.
Of course it is.
"Why didn't you mention that before?"
Ibecause I only just remembered it. Karys went silent, humming to himself. I remembered something new.
"I'm happy for you and all, but let's focus." Felix read the description again, but it wasn't too informative. "What does it do?" He focused on it again, and this time pressed with his Affinity and Intent, and knowledge of the ritual swept through his Mind. How to perform it, how to fuel it, and even how to infuse it with a touch of his own potency. He felt at that connection, the one that had set him in such a panic. The fight raged on, inside a large stone building now, the tension still as thick as the fear coming from Zara. He had to help. He could make this work.
"The cost...I have enough if you can help me, Pit," Felix said, and was immediately met by acceptance. The tenku held wide their bond, and Felix could feel his Mana sitting there. As if he could reach out and grasp it with his hands. Warmth and affection and urgency colored their connection, and Felix didn't wait.
Etheric Concordance is level 73!
Etheric Concordance is level 74!
"Mirk Enclosure."
A pulse of Mana, Essence, and shimmering song bursting in all directions. It was like pure joy spun into threads of music and Intent, a shield woven of the powers of creation; it sent shivers through Felix even as his Mana tore painfully out of his channels. The silver and gold light was subsumed by red-gold flames and blue-white electricity as Felix poured himself into the glyph beneath his feet. His glyph, he realized. It was the last thought he had before his consciousness was consumed by the spreading roil of power.
It and he were swept outward, toward every border of his new Territory. He felt as if he could have followed its progression in all directions at once, but instead focused upon the rolling storm of potency that flashed into the east. Toward Haarwatch, and beyond.
The Inquisition wants to come for us? Then let them come! Pit sent, a screech of challenge that echoed across the vast terrain of his Territory. Caught up in the frenetic joy of the ritual, Felix couldn't help but howl along with him.
In Haarwatch, a fog wall roared from the wilds like the storm of the century. Blue-white lightning scattered across its face and the Fiend's Legion called desperately for citizens to take shelter. Yet it rolled past them, harmless as a summer breeze, the thick fog turning translucent as it advanced until it vanished utterly. Gasps of surprise and elation crossed the Legionnaires' faces as notifications popped before every single one of them.
The fog wall rolled on, catching people in the streets, in their homes and slowly rebuilt houses. People shouted at its approach, but every single one felt a jolt of power once it had enveloped them. A surge of potency that left thousands gasping.
Cal stood atop her balcony as it hit, and immediately felt the change. Her regenerations were boosted, and her Strength and Willpower increased by a flat 5%, all due to something her Status was calling a Boon. She barely had time to see that before another message superceded it. This one was framed in gold and was twice as large as any other.
A Defensive Array Has Been Activated For the Territory of Nagast!
Lost No More!
A New Territorial Lord Has Risen!
Cal laughed as she read the rest of the notification. "You son of a bitch."
Zara chased after Reed and Kelgan, weakened immensely by the power she had been forced to expend, but she would not trust this to others. The Waystone had to be shut down, and without the proper protocols, it would take either the finesse of a Master to accomplish, or the power of one. She had spent the latter, but the former was always to hand.
Yet she had gotten barely to the relay chamber, noting the redcloaked bodies on the ground, when a shimmering wave of power swept over everything she saw. A pulse that ate across hidden sigaldry in the walls, burning them out as it passed. Popping and sizzling filled the air, and then all was quiet.
What in Avet's name?
The magelights in the Waystone had snuffed out, so she conjured an orb of aquamarine light. It illuminated the relay chamber, a place where the complicated mechanisms of ancient etheric technology would shift and turn, pumping Mana into the spires above. Kelgan and Reed stood in the center, looking confusedly at everything.
"It all just...stopped," Kelgan said. "It was going, and thennothing."
Reed shook his head. "Was that you? Why have us race in here if you could shut it down with such ease? You damn near burnt the Waystone out!"
"It was not me," Zara said. She strode forward, keen to hide her weakness from the Hand's angry eyes. "And they had started the sequences already. There is no way to stop it at that point, not short of ripping it apart." She tapped the mechanisms, convoluted brass things that escaped her knowledge. "These are quite whole. That wave of magic disrupted it, somehow. Shut it down."
"Then who did this?" Reed growled.
They were all interrupted by a sudden, golden-framed notification.
A Defensive Array Has Been Activated For the Territory of Nagast!
Lost No More!
"A defensive array? I've never heard of Nagast," Reed said in confusion. His next words were interrupted by another notification.
A New Territorial Lord Has Risen!
All Hail The Inheritor, Autarch of Nagast, Felix Nevarre!
"WHAT?" Reed roared and Kelgan looked like someone had just saved his life.
Indeed he should. Zara could sense the power of the array that had enveloped half the city. It was a roiling fog that spread out of the Verdant Pass and over the majority of Setoria. Already, guards and other folk were testing it, and finding themselves unable to penetrate the dense mist.
Reed whirled on her. "What has the Fiend done?"
Zara's heart hammered, as she heard the threads that sang beneath the System message. She wanted to leap for joy and curse that Felix had ever left her sight. Those threads weren't just transmitting this message to her, but to everyone. The entire Continent.
A new power had arisen, an untested one in a land known to perhaps only the eldest of scholars, but which would soon be beset by those willing to test its borders. To test this new 'Autarch.'
"Avet help us all."