Chapter 18-472: The Lands Above (2/2)

Golden purifying and cleansing magic joined the burning storm about them, and their bones pulsed visibly right through jet skin, swirling over the cloud of silken hair that wasn’t getting in the way at all somehow.

They relaxed somewhat, letting go and trusting, and little wisps of golden steam began to rise from their pores, eyes, ears, nose, mouth, and horns and frill. I could see the blackness of congealed Sin oozing out and burning from them, as a whole damn lot of holy energy came down on thousands of lifetimes of Sin, and they began to Atone for what they’d done.

It was a lot of Sin, a lot of burning, and a lot of pain. There was no doubt at all that the drow would never have gone through this process of themselves, but now they were, and only the Cohort wasn’t participating fully in the experience... but even they were daring to take on some of the load, understanding that the tempering of it was really going to be something useful. They had their own sins from life too, after all, and ritual Cleansing was part of almost every culture and religion.

This was how the Heavenbound did it, but never quite this intensely... or with Hellfire accelerating the process and making it that much worse.

But, they didn’t scream. They just sat in my arms and suffered as souls burned in repentance, and Australia rolled on by beneath us and was painted into The Map for miles and miles...

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“You can see on The Map the approximate locations of the other seven major drow settlements.”

Legion was taking long, deep breaths. It was time for me to go Pyramid-building, and they were stepping off onto a high mesa in the middle of nowhere in Australia, a further Consecrated and Hallowed ground prepared for them to keep at it.

“Yes,” they replied after a long moment, sighing, bones pulsing gold inside their skin, enduring the pain. “We will endure this, it is of our choice, but we may not be able to do this again.” They paused for emphasis. “The Sin of Yvradimyae was focused on Lust, and while they did horrid things to one another, it was generally acknowledged as the safest and most open of the eight cities.”

I winced. Ouch! They were basically saying those were the nice drow!

“I would rather wipe them now than when they can call on demon princes for back-up. How you choose to participate, if at all, is your choice.”

“Thank you.” Their eyes closed, little wisps of burning Sin rising up from them constantly. “We would make some Fiend very happy and fat with the Sin we are addressing.”

“I almost feel like releasing one of those succubi so you could gorge them on it, but I understand that defeats the purpose of what you are trying to do in the first place.” Sparkling diamonds with angry black centers swirled above my hand. If I stared at them hard, sets of lovely yet angry eyes in a variety of burning colors glared back at me.

It wasn’t for being trapped. It was for being taken out of Legion, because they definitely wanted to stay there, even if it meant going through an Atonement which would literally burn away a great deal of who they were.

“Ladies, we are going to be talking shortly. Be patient.” I stowed the twenty-five diamonds and their contents in my Masspack, and nodded to Legion. “I’ll be back in eight hours to help with what little I can.”

Legion nodded, gliding back and sitting down on the small raised stone there, swirls and mists of purity and rainbow rising from the Formation on the ground all around them. Their cloud of silken hair began to drift in the breeze of sacred power, bones pulsing gold inside jet skin, six scattered eyes above the Mask on the eyeless face shining in all their hues at the same time.

Sleipner was left behind on silent guard, the unicorn spirit’s natural Aura contributing to the sanctity of the place, while the wings of Teleportation sent me skipping along the Veil and the track of my life to a space folded between the lines of reality, where a lot of stone waited to be Shaped...

I had approximately twenty-two thousand blocks to make. At the level of quality I desired, it was approximately one a minute to execute roughly a thousand cubic feet at a QL of 70.

Sixteen hours a day, 960 blocks. Twenty-three days of work to put together over 4.5 million cubic feet of integrated runetech circuitry at a mind-boggling level of perfection. Focus of the Imperial Artisan came down, Concentration integrated with sculpting stone, and I got to work. Tons of waiting gold and platinum unwound in the finest of threads and layers of foil, integrating with the refined stone I shaped into perfect crystalline purity and alignment, and my endgame play went on, two miles below the Pattern to call down the end of the world above.

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Bard/6 (10). Witch/6. Magus/6. Binder/6 (10). Monk/6. Artificer/6 (10). Alchemist 6 (8). Grenadier/5. Expert/6, and finally my Warlock Masteries started coming in, almost on the eve of the New Year.

For whatever reason, the Witch Level let me take the first d6 of Wrath Mastery... probably because Witch was so secondary to my Wizard Class now there was nothing appropriate.

Then Expert/6 assigned the Delimited Spell-like Ability Feat to Warlock Wrath, raising the damage cap by five, and purchased Warlock Wrath/2, to +2d6.

The end of the calendar year arrived, although there was devoted talk to moving the calendar enough so that the Winter Solstice was the last day of the year, as was most appropriate, and the New Year started afterwards. The traditionalists and conservatives naturally argued against it, but the Churches of all kinds were basically in favor of it, as well as most of the spellcasters, who equated it to pure stupidity that the calendar year didn’t match the magical year, and was instead based on archaic religious days from centuries ago...