Chapter 18-462: Distractions and Maneuvers (2/2)

My Stone Shaping was at +48, but I would be using Imperial Artisan to sub my Concentration Modifier for it instead, greatly increasing the speed I was working at. +94 was at the level of Eternals, and that was without using any extra magical modifiers.

The power of doing it in increments is that you can do finer detail on each part, and if you can integrate them properly, the whole is far greater than the sum of the parts, like separate magic items coming together to form a conjoined Set.

I was making a Set item with literally thousands of pieces. The effects when they all came together was going to be something. If I made it as a single massive block, I’d get one effect that was really, really strong, and that would be about it.

The big thing was getting the golden ratio right, as the more geometrically precise it was, the purer the end result would be and the higher the QL. Getting all those separate parts moving together to that end result was part of the challenge, and the reason why the end result was so impressive.

This was the real use of Stone Shaping. Trying to do this with tools just wouldn’t work out well. You needed unreal amounts of time and practice, had to have the spell at high Valence, and you needed to work on a lot of stone at the same time.

A thousand cubic feet at a time was a nice starting point, and thus I began Shaping the foundation blocks for a forty-layer Pyramid. It was a big one, the extra levels meaning thousands of extra blocks had to be made... but this was going to be the Pyramid that defined the planet, so I had to do it right.

Anyways, I had inherited plenty of experience at this kind of thing, had all kinds of designs available to work with, and I definitely had the Caster Level to pull it all off.

In the absolute darkness two miles underneath the heart of the Russian Shroudzone, in a bend in space that random incorps ghosting by went right past without a clue it was there, I began to make the last and greatest thing I ever would on the planet, the truest use of my downtime.

When it was done, my endgame gambit was going to be in place, and then it would just be all about the distractions and conventional means.

I was all alone here. The only way to get in was Earthjumping to the right Seal, or forcibly tearing open a fold in space which basically wasn’t there, anchored to a molecule-wide band of stone. I’d even smoothly merged the flows of stone together on the outside, so there was no sign a chunk of reality had been removed here.

You’d have to know what you were looking for and be able to earthglide to find it, and that would require being literally right on top of it.

If it was found out, that would not be good, and we’d likely have to nuke the Pattern, doing things the much harder way.

No slip-ups, no errors, no lapses in focus. This had to be done right, or I expected the retaliation of the Aberrant was going to be apocalyptic.

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“Are you certain you’re okay?” Legion asked me softly.

I made a sort of noise as their tails didn’t stop the massage. I was using TK to do sort of the same thing to them, but they had to really relax to allow it to work, relative strength and everything.

Riding Sleipner had gone from being my dolorous time of tedium to being my time to relax. The whole Allegiance kind of got up on their toes when I went into full Concentration mode during my ‘eight hours of downtime’. It was very, very hard for the people to NOT stay on focus and intense during those eight hours. When I came out of them, some of the people not used to being so intense would actually collapse in relief.

Rearranging a lot of sleep schedules, I was.

The mapping of Eurasia via Commune was almost done, its grand and glorious Felldeep above the Strata all laid out, and the Deepsea beneath it mostly in place, which was Legion’s big project.

Joining me for this kind of ride, just watching The Map expand, was relaxing for Legion too, while Sleipner rolled along just above the ground across thousands of miles of plains, hills, and forests, Sustained engine humming happily.

Greatest Lived-Line evah. Unfortunately going to be useless when I left, at least to me.

“Is fine,” I finally mumbled into that impossibly soft, strong, and comfortable shoulder, their hair all gossamer caresses, smelling like wood smoke and seaspray and after-storm and all the wildflowers and sunshine... “I can maintain that for days straight if I have to. It’s actually how old Aelryinth does most of his work. Great for keeping chatter down. You don’t bug the Monarch when they are sitting there like a diamond sun in the sky, so intent your thoughts kinda bleed if you think too much at them.”

“Well, you’re shutting down all /tell traffic, so we expect we’re just getting residual awareness, too.” I smiled into my pillow-shoulder. Heaven’s Wrath was now playing in both directions, my side woven about with sacred magic and positive energy, theirs with Purity and layers of other Pacts. Much more equitable exchange now.

“You’re sounding very tense. Something happen?” I asked calmly.

They sighed, which is quite impressive in a few thousand subnotes. “We discovered an enclave of dark elves,” they admitted softly.

They’d been searching out some of the sub-Strata areas under the Spanish lands, crossing under Gibraltar and messing around in northern Africa. I wasn’t surprised yet another new race had popped up, even of elves. “Drow, I’m assuming?” Judging by their tone.

“Ninety percent of the genebase has demonic bloodlines. There were two dozen succubi among them, over a hundred half-demons, and they have a seeming demigoddess watching over them, a child of Erichidnea, who is a Pact Patron.”