Nialla exited into a spirit dry hole in the ground overgrown with rampant weeds and algae.

  She wasted no time in pouring her spirit into its new bodies, anxious to confirm the extent of the damage. There was a disorienting moment in which she occupied two bodies simultaneously, before, through the use of their soul bond, she merged their bodies much like she had their spirits.

  Sitting up from where she lay, she first gave herself a quick once over—not great, but not much worse than was to be expected—before noting the striking lack of any duplicitous mercenaries in her near vicinity.

  It would appear they’d done the smart thing and ran off at the first opportunity. A shame, but no matter. She would find them soon enough. They’d seen far too much to be allowed to live after all.

  All in due time, she told herself. All in due time.

  The vessel, she was surprised to discover, lay right where it had been, completely undisturbed—flaxen hair fanned out around her. Nialla briefly considered ending its miserable existence, then thought better of it. Let them watch as their world crumbles down around them. The mind was already long gone.

  Kill the body too and the spirit might yet be freed. She couldn’t have that, now could she? Her spirit still stung from all the cuts she received. Yet more damage that she’d need to repair before the day was done. No. Leave them to their fate. It was a far kinder one than they deserved, but it would serve.

  That settled, Nialla briefly contemplated sifting through the boy’s old memories for a route that would lead her to the surface, before she snorted. Why bother? Calling on her daughter’s bloodline, she opened a circular passage to the void—making sure to find a space free of both wandering debris and less than friendly multi-planar entities.

  Wouldn’t do to invite guests into this world that she couldn’t completely control. That done, she began actualizing one of the boy’s mantras—applying each of its etheric concessions with a slow, deliberate attentiveness.

  ABSOLUTE BURIAL

  A coffin emerged—snatching her up in short order and plunging her into total darkness. Surrounding her with oblivion’s embrace. As her sense of self faded away to nothing, a new sense blossomed in her mind. As if she’d suddenly been gifted with thousands of serpentine appendages.

  Taking the change at face value, with neither surprise nor delight, Nialla used her newfound limbs to drill a tunnel directly to the surface—any rubble dislodged as a result of the process promptly disappearing into the void where it would persist for all time. Two minutes and forty nine seconds passed before the tunnel was done. At which point she ceased her recitations, released her hold on the unorthodox mantra… then dropped like a stone.

  Immediately overwhelmed by inexplicable waves of exhaustion.

  What-?!

  An old hand at this by now, Nialla was rifling feverishly through the boy's memories before her cheek graced the hard ground. Anxious to see what present he’d left her with this time.

  That conniving little-! Bastard child-!

  Borrowed Time: The unrealized potential of all the lives lost in the heat of battle borrowed at great cost. See Absolute Burial for a more in-depth description.

  And what was this “cost” you might ask?

  It runs on fucking life force!? But that’s-! That’s absolutely absurd! Just how idiotic would you have to be-!

  Or, she suddenly realized, just how vindictive…? Had he really planned this far ahead? He couldn’t have, surely. Could he…?

  Nialla grit her teeth.

  Pushing herself up to her feet through force of will alone, she gave her body another quick once over and thought she might have to reassess her earlier assessment. Where he’d merely been thin before, she was now emaciated. Reed thin with a sickly pallor—knobby knees and elbow joints only partially obscured by a papery layer of skin. Nialla growled in frustration.

  It was just one inconvenience after another with this brat. Slamming the void portal closed with a swipe of her arm—grunting at the flash of pain the too swift action caused her elbow joint—she launched herself through the air. Clearing the tunnel she’d carved at great cost in less than a minute.

  Emerging from the tunnel, she was immediately greeted by the crisp air of a morning just past the crack of dawn. Finding herself inside of what appeared to be a large deciduous forest, she didn’t stop her rapid ascent until she’d cleared the tall canopy up above—bursting out into open air to better survey her surroundings. Tree cover for as far as the eye could see—pitifully short, in so far as such things went.

  Especially compared to what she was used to. Nevertheless, she decided it would serve as an impromptu beachhead for the coming invasion. Opening yet another void portal right there in the sky, this one several hundred times the diameter of the first, she called out to her children—the elite warriors who she’d long held in reserve. They answered her call with great alacrity—exploding from the yawning breach in a cascade of red eyes and midnight bodies.

  Breaking away from the main contingent, four of her children, aesthetically pleasing in their fitted black battle robes—each matching set of gold trimmed battle wear only serving to accentuate their slender proportions—hovered to kneel before her.

  Her generals.

  The one at their head, Primer—bedecked in more golden thread than all his likewise exulted brothers and sisters combined—spoke. His tone even and cultured, entirely devoid of the discordant curse of myriad tongues that plagued his lesser brethren.

  “What are your orders mother?”

  “Primer, Tangent, Predicate, Nominal. Prepare the others. Remember. Kill any that resist. Subjugate those that comply. I expect to have total dominion over this region within the day.”

  “Of course mother. Is there anything else you need done?”

  “No. You may go.”

  “Mother.”

  And so saying, the four bowed deeply before turning to rejoin their troops. Well armed and armored troops which were even now streaming from the portal by the thousands. Despite the haggard state she now found herself in, she couldn’t help but smile at the sight.

  She hadn’t lied either. She truly did expect that, by the end of the day, this entire frontier would be hers. By the end of the month, the continent. And by the end of the year…? Well, that much would come later. Right now, she needed to focus on repairing her spirit. Only then would she think of world domination.

  Amidst the ruin of a once opulent bathhouse, now heavily choked with dust and debris, a shadowed something can be seen to move through the nigh impenetrable shroud. There is the grinding sound of shifting stone. The crash as one slab of rubble is heaped atop another. Then come a series of hacking coughs which bounce eerily off the cavernous walls.

  A figure moves, staggers stiffly to their feet.

  This content has been unlawfully taken from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.

  With sunlight weakly filtering in through a striated hole in the ceiling, one can just barely make out a cherubic face, almost doll-like in its proportions—every line, every contour, caked in a layer of fine white powder. Everything, that is, but her startling gray eyes. Eyes which did not belong on that of an eleven year old child. Eyes that had witnessed the ends of empires. Eyes which had helped those empires fall.

  The first world avatar hawks a gritty glob of phlegm onto the rubble strewn floor. Grimacing in distaste, she turns her attentions upward—peering through the screen of dust into the gaping hole beyond. It would take some doing to reach the surface, she noted idly.

  Luckily for her, the scree of leftover rubble should act as something of a ramp, if an entirely unreliable one. It wasn’t much farther from there to the first of many handholds. She could reach, if just barely. And then, all that would be left for her to do was climb. She glanced down dubiously at her stick thin arms and malnourished frame.

  Drawing a thin tendril of ether into herself—not nearly enough to kill her, just enough to reinforce her bones and promote accelerated myofibrillar hypertrophy—she briefly took a second to revel in the agonizing inundation of strength. A second was all she gave herself however. In the next she was slipping and sliding up the shifting hill of rock.

  She would need a name, she decided, even as she latched onto the first roughly hewn handhold.

  Should she dredge up one of the many aliases given to her in her past life? Or, a novel concept, should she choose to be spontaneous instead? She could adopt the name given to the body’s previous inhabitant. There was no reason why she should not. On the contrary, after all that time spent idle, she was feeling somewhat adventurous.

  Emilia it is then.

  She couldn’t believe she was saying this, but it would actually be… fun to start over again with a clean slate. Illogical, she knew, but it didn’t make it any less true. Perhaps the boy was rubbing off on her. Emilia shifted her feet and reached for the next handhold, nearly falling to her death when the rock crumbled away in her hands. If only they could see her now.

  They probably wouldn’t have even made the connection between the weak child she now inhabited, and the life devouring entity that nearly succeeded in swallowing the greater multiverse whole.

  “It was at barely a quarter past dawn, this morning, when news of an attack on the Barony of Westmarch reached the Royal court by currier. Fifteen minutes later, news of a similar attack on Viscount Dumont’s lands arrived on our doorstep, just as refugees from Westmarch began streaming into the capital. In the next two hours five baronies, two viscounties, and one earldom reported similar incursions. Armor clad warriors with the heads of beasts descending from the skies in mass.

  “Since then, we’ve had no word from the westernmost parts of the frontier, though refugees continue to trickle east in scant ones and twos. It is the joint opinion of the founding family heads that the western lands of the frontier have already been lost to us. This sorry state of affairs, as you can likely surmise, leaving very little buffer between these unknown assailants and the kingdom’s capital.”

  Cecilia finished her practiced little speech with a sardonic smile. Trying to make light of the bleak situation the kingdom now found itself in, if only because naked desperation would not aid her here.

  “And you’re telling me all of this… why?”

  The woman sitting across from Cecilia, immaculately composed in her elegant gray gown, took another careful sip from her cup of tea. Her every movement graceful and precise—her manner without flaw, etiquette impeccable. Cecilia followed her example, trying to project a similar aura of calm, even though what she really wanted to do was leap across the table and demand the proud woman render them aid right that very instant.

  “This tea is excellent,” Cecilia commented, as etiquette demanded.

  The woman gave the weakest flicker of a smile.

  “Thank you. My son purchased it for me. I’m told it was very expensive.”

  Cecelia winced. That it hadn’t exactly been her fault what happened to the poor boy, likely wasn’t an argument that would heavily sway the woman’s opinion. She’d already been on thin ice with the grieving mother before this entire debacle had kicked off.

  Heavens preserve us.

  Which one of them had thought this would be a good idea again? Oh right! She’d been the one to suggest it, now hadn’t she? Cecilia took a deep, steadying breath before continuing. She decided honesty was the best policy with this woman, else-wise they’d be at it all day.

  “To answer your earlier question, I’ve come to ask for your help.”

  The woman’s eyebrows arched in such an exaggerated manner that it was immediately clear she wasn’t even trying to mask her thinly veiled mockery.

  “And what, might I ask, is the provincial second wife of a minor frontier lord supposed to do when presented with such weighty matters of state? I will, of course, do whatever it is I can, but surely your efforts are better served elsewhere?”

  Cecilia had to bite back a snarl of frustration. Even now, the unstoppable tread of this invading army could be on their way to ravage her holdings next.

  “Please, let us do away with the pretenses. We both know a second wife is the least of what you are.”

  “Yes of course. I am first and foremost a mother.”

  Cecilia slammed a fist down on the table, making the ceramic tea set rattle, while the woman looked on impassively—hand held protectively over the rim of her cup.

  “Was it not you that came to me demanding certain allowances for your… for your son not too long ago? The procurement of those tournament slots wasn’t exactly trivial. And yet, despite that, did you hear me utter even the semblance of complaint?”

  Not that she’d really had much of a choice. They both knew she hadn’t, but she still thought it worth the reminder.

  “Surely a favor freely given warrants just a bit of transparency in turn?”

  The woman, Lanyue Zhaoshen frowned, as if thinking the question over, before her face and tone lost what little expression it had previously possessed. When she spoke next, it sent literal shivers down Cecilia’s spine.

  “So be it. You’ve come seeking my aid? I refuse. You may leave at any time. Although, if you wish to stay and finish your cup, I will not stop you.”

  Cecilia was rendered speechless for several long seconds.

  “J-just like that?”

  “I see no reason to get involved.”

  “But your family-!”

  “Is currently several li beneath our feet. Likely fighting for his life in a bid to reach the surface.”

  “But-! You say that as if it’s not something you could easily rectify! Look, I understand why you might have reason to be cross with me, but this-!”

  Lanyue blinked, as if genuinely taken aback.

  “Cross with you? He will become much stronger in the striving. What right have I to take that away from him?”

  “I-!” now it was her turn to be taken aback. “And if he dies?” she couldn’t help but wonder.

  “Then he was unworthy. A stain on the family name and undeserving of his heritage,” she took another delicate sip from her cup.

  That was… unnecessarily harsh. And she called herself a mother? Cecilia had to fight to steer the conversation back toward the topic at hand.

  “I- I don’t know how else to convince you, but…”

  Cecilia rose to her feet before lowering herself until her forehead rested against the cold floor.

  “I would beg of you. Please. We, the founding frontier families, don’t know much about your past, nor from which imperial branch you hail, but what we do know is that a single word from your lips could very well mean the difference between life and death for millions. If you could only find it in your heart to-”

  “I refuse.”

  “But-!”

  “No.”

  Cecilia felt the finality of that last statement, and, face burning with shame and fury, she slowly rose to her feet with as much dignity as she could manage.

  “So that’s it then?”

  “It is.”

  The bland look Lanyue gave her, unconcerned that she was condemning millions to death, nearly succeeded in breaking her carefully maintained composure.

  “I see. I bid good day to you then,” and so saying, she promptly spun on her heel and stomped towards the door.

  “Wait.”

  Cecilia stopped, not daring to hope.

  “What did you say these beasts looked like again?”

  Cecilia turned, taking in the pensive frown on Lanyue’s ageless face.

  “Humanoid, for the most part. Skin the color of pitch with eyes of crimson and sucker laden tentacles in place of nose or mouth. Why?”

  The woman’s frown only grew deeper.

  “And their leader. What does she look like.”

  “I… wasn’t aware that it was a she,” the woman merely continued to stare, not deigning to elaborate. “From eye witness accounts there is one being to which the majority of these creatures seem to defer to. It’s skin is the color of fresh snow or alabaster.”

  “A woman?” it came out more of a statement than a question.

  “Well, no, actually. At least no reports I’ve seen describe the creature as such. It appears younger than the others. Almost sickly. In place of tentacles it’s face is rather human. Boyish, I’ve heard it described, though I find that hard to believe.”

  “And he is… leading these creatures?”

  “Ostensibly, yes.”

  Abruptly the air in the room became very still, almost immovable. It was to the point that Cecilia was having a hard time taking a single breath, chest heaving but no air deigning to heed her call. And all the while Lanyue stared off into the distance—apparently unaware of the effect her presence was having.

  “There’s been a change of plans,” the pressure released and Cecilia was allowed a ragged intake of breath. “I will investigate this invasion. You will accompany me.”

  “That-! Does that mean…?! You’ll be calling on your allies from the empire?”

  She couldn’t believe it. It was too good to be true.

  “What? No. My presence should suffice,” and so saying the woman got up and rounded the table, unaware or just uncaring of the crestfallen look that crossed Cecilia’s face.

  “But-! Surely you can’t mean to-!”

  When Lanyue reached her she wasted no time in planting a hand firmly on the nape of Cecilia’s neck like she was some unruly hound. Before she could even think to protest, the woman continued.

  “Brace yourself.”

  Then, there was the telltale lurch of space warping around them, and in the next moment the spacious, if humble, drawing room was entirely devoid of occupants.