Everywhere he went, it was the same. His fellow Sages had been massacred in their sleep. He saw the occasional body of a Death Beast mixed in with the fallen. At least they’d managed to take a few enemies with them. The level of carnage was unreal. Not a single Sage or even a servant, trainee, or candidate was left living, save for himself.
Gallian slowly made his way back to Sanctuary, his heart heavy. While he was once again certain of his innocence in the attack on Sanctuary, it was of little consequence. Everyone he’d ever known was now dead.
Panting and wheezing, he reached the giant doors, and he cloistered himself inside the Sigmonium walls once again.
Gallian was suddenly exhausted. He’d used far too much energy and hadn’t taken any real time to rest. He walked over to a nearby bench and bent down to take a seat. Rather than sit on it, however, he fell through to the ground, giving himself a bad bruise on his tailbone.
The young Sage quickly healed the injury with a fixhurt spell and got back up. That’s odd, he thought. Why would there be an illusionary bench here?
Almost instinctively, he tried to wave his hand through the bench to dispel the illusion, only to find it very much real this time. His hand recoiled in pain and he cursed at himself. Then he gingerly moved his hand towards the bench again, slower this time. This time, it passed right through again.
Gallian slowly put his other hand up to his forehead and took in a few deep breaths to try and calm himself down before doing anything else.
I’d heard rumors that using the forbidden Tytin magicks could drive one insane, but I didn’t think it would happen that fast! Here I am, staring at a bench and I can’t even tell if it’s real! I must be going crazy!
The young Sage removed his hand and tried to touch the bench one more time, but slower. Sure enough, it felt quite real again. He had no idea what was going on, but he needed to rest so he sat down again while keeping his hand on the bench to try and force it to stay in existence. It worked. He let out a sigh of relief and allowed himself a few moments of rest while he thought about what to do next.
He had no living Sages to turn to for advice, so he decided to try and contact the only other font of information he could think of – the Sage Mind.
Long ago, the great Sage Olon Mills had come into contact with the entity known as the Sage Mind. It was fabled that this disembodied entity knew everything that ever had or ever would come to pass, though it would not reveal its secrets easily.
Of course, most Sages could never connect with it anyway. It was said that only those who had used Tytin magic at some point in the past could speak to the Sage Mind, as if having done so somehow altered the mind in a way that was necessary to make communication. But now that Gallian had cast two Tytin spells of his own, he might be able to reach out and make contact.
Sage Gallian took a few deep breaths to calm himself and tried to reach out to the Sage Mind in the manner he had read about in books as a child. At first nothing happened, but then he sensed something at the edge of his own mind that felt . . . foreign. Like an invader trying to break down the fragile walls of his consciousness and let itself in. And yet, the presence did not seem to harbor any ill will. Gallian could sense no malice from the presence. He thought this must be the Sage Mind. So he chanted the words of the spell and waited.
Took you long enough, a strange, alien voice resounded in his head. Rookie.
Hey, it’s not like I have anyone here to guide me! Gallian fired back at the voice.
Well, duh, the Sage Mind replied. If there were, you wouldn’t have come to me.
What’s that supposed to mean? He frowned at the voice, uncertain if it could see him.
Does it matter?
Gallian thought for a second but decided it did not. He shook his head.
Good, the Sage Mind continued. Now why did you reach out to me? What’s going on? An image of someone tapping their foot came to him.
Gallian started to form a thought to reply to the voice in his head, but it cut him off. Ah, I see. The old disappearing-reappearing bench bit. Yeah, it sounds like a substance-illusion spell to me. The real bench is probably long gone by now.
“Of course!” Gallian shouted aloud. “A substance-illusion spell! That makes so much sense!”
The young, foolhardy Sage started to dance around in joy at the discovery. Things were finally starting to fall into place. Sanctuary most certainly had been ransacked, at least in part. The Wyvern-Masters had placed substance-illusions in place of anything they had stolen in hopes of fooling anyone that remained.
And it had almost worked.
Now he had a different problem. Gallian had to figure out which relics were truly missing, and which were still there, and with powerful illusion magicks at play, that would be quite the task.
Don’t worry about it, the Sage Mind’s voice said at once, I’ll help you figure it out.
Sage Gallian had forgotten the Sage Mind’s presence was still there. He was all at once welcome for the help and curious as to how the entity had read his thoughts.
Well, I am in your mind, it said then. Besides, it’s not that hard. An image of a child grinning came to him.
Gee, thanks, Gallian replied wryly. He was starting to wonder just how good of an idea it had been to
