Bernard gazed out across the Crater, his view stretching…not as far as he would have expected. He stood atop the pyramid, at the very apex of Nemesis, yet the sulfuric clouds and choking gases created a haze that blocked sight beyond a couple of miles. Still, despite its deadly dangers, the Crater was beautiful when viewed this way.
“Is it safe to breathe?” he asked.
“Here, yes. You are within Nemesis’ bubble. The air is purified within a couple of hundred feet of the mountain. Out there? You would probably be fine. Extended exposure for those below 200 is inadvisable, though,” Nephthys explained, staring out as well, likely seeing far more than he.
“Granted, that is assuming one does not stumble upon one of the more deadly puddles of gas that cling to divots and points of low elevation,” she clarified.
“Lovely,” Bernard quipped.
While he ate his meal, Nephthys had filled him in on generalities about their time here. The details were…hazy, but he did not expect her to explain her guild’s entire history in one sitting, to little more than a stranger, no less.
He was interested in why Nemesis had been sealed away for two hundred years by an impenetrable energy barrier, but questions all had their times.
Her story of slavering tribes occupying the Strip and launching an assault on Nemesis was interesting as well, yet again, she had been sparse on the details. She merely informed him that Nemesis ‘handled’ the invaders, while sheltering the former prisoners.
Many questions lingered in his mind, but if he were being honest with himself, none of it was his business, not yet, at least. Thus far, Nephthys had yet to actually ask anything of him, though he suspected requests were coming soon.
Shortly after he had finished eating, she asked to speak in private, teleporting them both up here, to the top of the mountain Nemesis was built around and within.
“You mentioned that the former slaves were part of what you wished to speak with me about?” Bernard prodded, attempting to move things forward.
“Yes. To tell you the truth, Baron Buchanan, I have been…conflicted of late,” she said, surprisingly hesitant.
“Conflicted, my lady?” Bernard responded, his curiosity piqued.
“Haa,” she sighed. “Not you, too. Please, call me Nephthys, my name.”
“Very well, Nephthys,” Bernard chuckled. “Then, please call me Bernard.”
Nephthys nodded with a small smile before looking out over the choking wastes below.
“To tell you the truth, Bernard, I have been debating whether reaching out and interacting with the world again is wise. We have everything we need here. I would wager that the quality of life one could have within Nemesis is comparable to even the most exquisite of luxuries in any country around the world,” she guessed.
Bernard nodded. What little he had seen of the guild told him that her guess was probably accurate. Magic artifacts were expensive, but if one had the means, they could provide nearly any amenity or comfort one could desire.
However, he knew of no artifact powerful enough to control the climate in an enormous pyramid sitting atop an active volcano. And climate control was just one of the absurd luxuries he had observed, despite only glimpsing a couple of rooms.
“I have no desire to rule, Bernard. I do not wish to found and run a nation. Yet, with certain power comes certain…responsibilities. I do not boast when I say that we, Nemesis, are a force that could turn the world upside down. Such power, even unused, perhaps especially when unused, will draw attention.
“Whether I wish it or not, we will be drawn into international politics. Even the very beginning stage of attempting to establish a line of communication with the world has me meeting with a baron,” she said, nodding at Bernard.
“I have not seen Nemesis’ full capabilities, but from what little I have, I believe you are correct, Nephthys. Existing powers will not sit idly. They will seek to claim your power for their own, and if they cannot…” he trailed off, the implication clear.
“They will try,” Nephthys declared firmly.
Goosebumps crawled up Bernard’s arms, the hair on the back of his neck standing on end. The idea of a Nemesis-versus-the-world scenario was not entirely unrealistic, but that was not what disturbed him.
What disturbed him was that the side he felt pity for was the world.
“Apologies, Bernard. These issues are my own, Nemesis’ own, to grapple with. I merely named them to give you background.
“As I said, I have neither the desire nor the intention to claim land and rule. However, I do want at least one reliable trade route to the rest of the world. This, as I am sure you can imagine, would require much effort. A path would need to be carved from Gloamview to the Crater, and it would need to be maintained,” she explained.
“That is…quite an ask, Nephthys,” Bernard said, caught off-guard by the magnitude of her plans.
Not much short of two thousand miles—that was the length of this ‘trade route’ that she was contemplating. Not only was it a monumental distance, but it was a monumental distance through the most dangerous lands on the planet.
Radaar still, after two hundred years, had made no progress into the Gloam. On the contrary, the Gloam had gained ground, so much so that it was practically knocking on Gloamview’s door—or was.
Bernard understood that Nemesis was behind pushing the Gloam back hundreds of miles. Another fact that he was forced to swallow silently for now to keep him awake tonight, and probably the rest of the week.
“It is. There are prospects already underway, however. I believe that, with the foundation being laid as we speak, the task will not be quite so unrealistic as you are likely imagining, though it will still be difficult and time-consuming,” she reasoned.
“I will take your word for it, but Nephthys, I must ask: why? Why have you come to me? True, my territory borders the Gloam, but I am a simple Baron.
“Surely, you should be speaking with Count Baracourt, at the very least. Perhaps even Marquis Douglas. This undertaking, regardless of how your machinations will simplify the process, is a matter of nations, not a single barony in the wilderness,” Bernard said.
A silence passed between them, both looking out over the Crater, the roiling clouds of sulfur, the wavering heat haze rising from the burning basalt. The silence lingered long enough that Bernard began to wonder if he had mispoken.
Had he perhaps given the impression he was against Nephthys’ proposal? He was not against the idea outright. He merely wondered how a baron could possibly assist such an extreme undertaking.
“Whom do you serve, Bernard?” Nephthys suddenly asked, not looking at him.
“Pardon?” Bernard responded, unsure what specifically she wished to hear.
“Where do your loyalties lie? Are you a man of your territory? Do you serve Radaar? Sardvend? Maybe a god or goddess holds your fealty?” she asked, glancing at him out of the corner of her eye.
“I am just a man trying to make sure my people live a good life, Nephthys. Nothing more, nothing less. My loyalties are to them,” he declared firmly.
Nephthys nodded, returning her eyes to the horizon with a small smile.
“So, if you saw chaos sweeping through Radaar and no figures of authority rising up to stabilize it, what would you do?” she asked.
Bernard snapped his head around, staring intently at Nephthys in profile.
“Surely you are not—” he started, heat rising in his throat.
“I, we, are not going to do anything, Bernard. I speak only of events that are already unfolding independently from Nemesis’ return to the world,” she said calmly, putting a hand on his shoulder.
She held his gaze for a few moments before turning back to the vista.
“It is possible that I am wrong, that I have misread the signs, misinterpreted the information I have, but I suspect that Radaar’s tenuous stability is going to collapse, and it will happen soon,” she said ominously.
“What—how could you possibly know that? What have you seen to—” Bernard started, flustered.
The ground began to shake, a great rumbling sounding throughout the Crater. The vibrations grew so strong that he was forced to grip the half-wall before him tightly, lest he lose his footing.
With a mighty bellow, a great titan of basaltic skin, magma glowing from the cracks, blasted through the surface of the earth. So large was the behemoth that as it rose from its burrow, its head, split into four leaves with rows of sharp teeth, rose to be level with him and Nephthys atop the pyramid.
The creature roared, a cry to deafen the world, and Bernard covered both his ears, resisting the urge to duck fully behind the wall. Battlefield instincts told him to find cover, but he knew there was no escaping such a sound.
He turned toward Nephthys, ready to bolt for the door and the safety—he hoped—of the pyramid, but he stopped short. The look on her face was nothing new, a neutral to peel the paint off walls, yet it had a quality of frustration to it that sent the hairs on his neck rising once again.
She stared at the colossal creature, a being fit to tear Radaar apart in its entirety, with what could only be described as mild annoyance.
“My lady, apologies,” a demon said, appearing in a puff of blue smoke.
He was different from the ones Bernard had seen guarding the throne room. His armor was adorned with glowing enchantments. He had horns curving across his skull, holes in his helmet accommodating them, and he bore a regality that chaotic demons lacked.
This one was powerful, far higher-ranked than the ones from the throne room.
“One of my scouts was attempting to chart the underground tunnels around Nemesis and seems to have disturbed a magma wyrm nest,” he explained, bowing his head.
Magma wyrms? A fitting name, Bernard thought, alarmed at his own casualness of thought.
“It is no trouble, Hannibal,” Nephthys said, holding her hand before her face. She made something akin to an ‘okay’ sign, her thumb and forefinger meeting to cover the enormous wyrm in the distance.
“That a broodmother lurked so close to the surface, to us, means they were overdue for a culling,” she said.
She opened her thumb and forefinger, and though he was not particularly sensitive to magic, Bernard felt something pass through him. It was like an invisible shockwave went through his body. The disconnect between the feeling and the environment's lack of response to it, like his clothes fluttering or hair blowing, was disconcerting.
“It is dealt with,” Nephthys declared, crossing her arms before her once again.
Bernard foolishly wondered what she was talking about when the sky suddenly ignited. A flash that was simultaneously faster than a blink and also lasted long enough for him to witness every minute detail filled the air. A straight line of purple stretched from above the clouds to the ground, spearing straight through the broodmother’s body.
However, the line was razor-thin, and the wyrm was so large that it surely would not notice, even if the line were an actual razor.
A purple light came arcing down the ray, tracing it like water running down a fishing line, yet its path was jagged and rough. It struck straight into the ground, and both the light and line vanished entirely, though they stayed seared into his eyes.
There was a brief moment of silence, as if the world was holding its breath, before the ground beneath the wyrm exploded. Shards of rock went flying at speeds Bernard could not track, impacting a thin blue barrier that sprang into existence around the mountain-pyramid, which likely saved his life.
The wyrm thrashed, casting its head to the sky and opening its mouth. What emerged was not another bellow to render him deaf, but a spray of what must be its internals, died a magma-orange. The wyrm collapsed, its impact shaking the ground so violently that Bernard was thrown from his feet, hitting the hard stone with a grunt.
Despite the throbbing in his backside and hands, where he caught himself, sweat dripped down his back, and he clenched his entire body to prevent the instinctive shaking. What he had just witnessed, the whole event from wyrm emergence to destruction, was not something he could contend with.
This place, these people…he and they lived in entirely different worlds.
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