42 – The Top of the Tower

"This is the top of Tower? Really?" I asked with suspicion. "So do I get a reward for it?"

"To reach this place is already its own reward, is it not? For here lies the gateway to infinite possibility. To touch the source, or seek what lies beyond. But you already knew that, did you not? I have been observing you since you traversed a Harmonic Corridor to arrive here." As it spoke, the spirit gained greater definition and detail.

"Harmonic Corridor?"

"The corridors that carry the energies of creation and chaos and other things between the myriad worlds or planes, whatever you wish to call them, within our sea of the infinite primordial chaos. The rolling lanes of shadow cast by the branches of the great tree that binds our system of reality. You may know them by another name, but it is the current you used to get to my Tower across the infinite chaos with the aid of your spirit device."

There was a moment of silence while I processed the fact that apparently the Builder knew more about how I planeshifted than I did. Had he been a traveler too? Had Hwa Ryun's story been more than just myth?

"I've yet to meet anyone else who knew of such things," I said. "I had thought that my method of travel might be unique."

"In a way, it is. You are the first whom I've met in countless eons who found a path to the Lesser Gate, and then used it to successfully access the corridors and travel the planes. After all, that was not their intended purpose, indeed, this system of creation has many protections in place to prevent such a thing, to protect these seeds of creation from those who would prey on them. To confine each plane's denizens to their own worlds, to prevent interference from powerful Outsiders, and to keep out the terrible things lurking in the chaos that would consume all of creation if given the chance."

"By protections, you mean similar to the force that started suppressing me in the Tower?"

"Correct. Those are the protections against entities and concepts foreign to a world's natural order. But there are also protections that prevent entities significant to a world from being removed. There are protections for the inner workings of the system itself, to prevent unauthorized access. Though the latter two stop most travelers before they can reach another plane, not to mention the Chaos itself which is very difficult to survive." The Builder's will paused for a moment, before looking me up and down, as if trying to discern something about me. "And that is what makes you, and that device of yours, quite a curiosity. Tell me, would you say that you were insignificant in your original homeworld? In terms of spiritual power, presence, and history?"

"I'm not entirely sure what you mean. It's not as if nobody would miss me, and I can't predict the future so I wouldn't know if I would have been important or not. Why do you ask?"

"As I said, there are protections to prevent significant entities from being removed from a plane. The greater their spiritual presence and history, which is usually tied to mystical power too, the greater the ties that bind them, and the more aggressively those protections will seek to stop their removal. This is the primary reason that travelers are so rare. Those who are insignificant will never find their way here. Those powerful enough to do so are generally more significant, and so bound tighter and unable to leave. For example, the most common type of being that can find a path to the Lesser Gate are those beings often worshipped by lesser beings as gods—but that very worship, their great power and long history, their divine authorities given by the world, the mantles they've accepted, all these ties bind them. But when I look at your soul, I see traces of multiple different planes, and almost none of your current powers, material substance, spirit companions, and items, appear to have any history with the plane that possesses the greatest claim on your soul. Even the spirit device you use to control your travel spell does not appear to be from the same origin."

That was an impressive amount he'd managed to glean about me. Thus far the Builder's will seemed relatively friendly and could be a great source of information that I was unlikely to get anywhere else, so I decided to cautiously keep the conversation going.

"I suppose if you put it that way, then yes, I was insignificant in my home world. I had no powers of any kind back then."

The spirit nodded. "I thought as much. You did not create that device, did you? But perhaps that is why you have avoided greater reprisals, to the point where this was the first time you encountered the Anti-Outsider protections. You were beneath the notice of the planar protections when you first left your home world, and remained largely unnoticed by the planes you intruded upon, until now."

"I've met a Beast before though. Some sort of impossibly powerful thing that tried to kill me when I was leaving another plane, in this same place at the edge of reality," I gestured around us.

"Ah yes. You must have taken something significant with you, perhaps the element spirit seed in your body. It is impressive that you survived the encounter intact at your current level of strength."

"Intact might not be the right description…but I guess I got better," I said mournfully, thinking of how close I came to death and the loss of Agate.

"Then you are fortunate, and you are in a unique position of opportunity. You have become like a virus or parasite that has taken on properties from multiple hosts and rendered each individual plane's standard immune system incapable of responding quickly or effectively. The analogy is quite crude, but that is essentially what you have done by combining the concepts of multiple planes and gaining spiritual weight and history with them before you became significant enough to trigger stronger defenses."

"Is that so? If I'm like a virus, is that not something you should be concerned about?"

It chuckled deeply. "I could hardly condemn you for doing something similar to my original self. Envy, perhaps, if I did not already succeed so long ago, because this is the ambition of many lesser beings. There are many primordial gods, the ones that participated in the creation of this system, who regretted their sacrifice and grew to resent the shackles they placed upon themselves. Most are dead in all the ways that matter by now, having become part of their world's systems rather than independently conscious beings, who would despise or envy us, but that should not deter you."

"I see…you seem to know a lot about these systems, could I trouble you for some advice?"

"It would be more enjoyable for you to discover them yourself, but I may consider humoring you a little bit. I assume you want to know how to mitigate and avoid triggering the planar defenses in the future?"

"Yes, exactly. And what would happen to me if I stayed?"

"It is nothing to be alarmed about at the level you were subject to. These defenses are not intelligent. It will first suppress you, and you will be unable to siphon more creation dust while suppressed but it should have no significant consequences if you do not commit further violations of the natural order—doing that which is not normally possible in that plane. But if you do, or do anything that is a particularly severe violation, it will trigger a process of fully expelling you out of the creation zone, which may take several days or weeks.

"Did I even do anything that was a violation in the Tower?"

The spirit shrugged. "The act of siphoning creation dust is always a low level violation, so it is only a matter of time until the planar defenses notice you. But sometimes it will trigger from a large working of magic or large expenditure of mana. As a whole, magic—the kind that deals with spells and not the manipulation of Shinsoo—is quite rare in the Tower. Especially when the magic is enacted without any contract with a demon or divine entity. Your particular brand of magic is outside of the regular rules of the Tower."

That made some sense. I vaguely recalled there was a rule like that for magic in the Tower of God. And I could think of a few other settings where magic was exclusively sourced from contracts with higher dimensional beings. So despite the effect of my magic not being anything special, the way I had accomplished it was against the natural order on this plane.

"I see. And how do I mitigate it after it happens?"

"As I said, you are analogous to a virus. How can you trick or otherwise convince the host plane that you belong? There are a number of ways, but I will tell you two that should be convenient to you. The first is to do the same thing you did when you first arrived to merge yourself back into the plane using some creation dust. This should reset the 'flag' on you, so to speak. But be warned, if you do this too many times the plane will learn from it, and get better at identifying you, or create 'antibodies'—counteragents to kill you, instead of merely expelling you."

"Oh, that's easier than I'd thought. It sounds like that means I could just go back to the Tower right now if I use some 'creation dust', then? I don't even have to leave and come back."

"A quick and easy solution to be sure, but if I were you, I would consider the use of creation dust to be a large drawback and only use it sparingly. After all, it is quite a precious and rare resource, unless you have some other way to get it besides siphoning from the excess that floats around the Lesser Gate."

"What do you mean? What's wrong with my current method? By creation dust, you're talking about Primordial Grain, right?"

He gave me a long look that seemed to express disbelief.

"I mean, it's just a matter of time to collect it, right? It isn't actually limited, or is it?" I asked, confused. "Besides the fact that I can only store a limited amount."

"How should I say this…? It is not technically limited, but there is only ever a small amount of excess in a plane, if any at all. One might imagine it as a nutrient that the body of the plane occasionally leaks out in significant enough quantities that it is not reabsorbed and instead accumulates outside the Lesser Gate. But once you siphon all the excess, it could take anywhere from years to decades, maybe even longer, for more to leak. I'm sure you can imagine the consequences if you run out and cannot find new pastures or get marked for expulsion by the planar defenses."

"Oh. Oh. Hold on a second, I need to check something."

I sent orders to Agate to give me a report on the grain gathering operation since we'd entered the Tower. It had gathered 1 unit in the first week, then stopped because Agate had added a condition for the program to stop running after reaching 8 units, because we'd believed that was the cap after being unable to siphon more on FoZ.

Then I ordered it to resume the spell. And it seemed to be working just fine.

Shit. That wasn't a cap on my storage after all, FoZ had simply run out of excess grain, and it'd started re-absorbing too fast for me to siphon it.

This…this changed everything. If primordial grain, or creation dust, wasn't unlimited, then I could be forced to go to new planes for a chance to collect more, or worse, get stuck if I ran out. At least with the bionanites my lifespan wasn't biologically limited as far as I knew, but it was still troubling if I wound up in that situation. After all, it would be foolish to assume that my soul or any other vital part of me was immune to the passage of time.

"Now you understand. Fortunately there are planes which frequently leak excess and generate it quite quickly. This is one of them, due to the conditions of the surrounding Chaos and the unique properties of the Tower. It normally takes only a few weeks to months here to leak enough for you to use."

"But if merely siphoning the dust could cause me to be flagged, doesn't that still mean that if I get flagged before I manage to take a full unit, I'd be losing grain still?"

"Yes, but there is a second method to mitigate the defenses, which allows you to continue siphoning, albeit likely at a slower rate. I call it a threshold invitation. This is when you find a summoner—a magical contractor—native to the plane who shall serve as a host inviting you into the threshold, to act on their behalf. Be warned that offering such a contract itself shall draw the immediate attention of the planar defenses, but it will be restrained, so long as you willingly accept restrictions upon yourself, and you truly are acting on behalf of the host. For the contract to succeed, the host must have free will and strong desires to fulfill, they need to be aware that they are making this invitation, and sustain your right to exist in the plane with mana supplied to you through a mystic bond. It may be helpful to think of them as both your sponsor and advocate, and it is their willpower and resistance against the world's corrective force that grants you sanctuary."

"Can anybody serve as a host?"

"Only those with sufficiently strong desires in their soul and a certain pride or resentment, a deep seated belief that the world is wrong and it is their prerogative to correct it by committing another wrong—by summoning an abomination against the natural order. They also need to have a minimum of mystic power and mental fortitude, to impose their belief on reality—much like any other working of magic. If they're not able to supply you with enough energy, you will find it difficult to act, because you need to use their energy to pay for the use of any of your unnatural abilities and counter the corrective force. But with the right host, this method will grant you almost unfettered access to your powers for as long as the contract lasts, albeit at the cost of only using it at the host's behest."

"Hmm…I could work with that, but finding a good host sounds like it could be quite a pain. And you say they have to be aware that they're making the invitation—you mean they need to know I'm from another plane?"

"As long as they know you are foreign to their concept of 'world' and 'natural reality' and that you need a willing invitation from them to avoid being removed. It does not matter if they think you are a demon from hell, a long dead spirit, an eldritch god, an imaginary creature, or plane traveler. Just that you do not belong, and they are inviting you past the world's natural protections against such beings. There are planes where such invitations are commonly used for entities that exist in different dimensions or otherwise outside the material world yet within the same creation zone governed by a single Lesser Gate, but the same ritual principles can be used on planar level Outsiders like yourself. You happen to have the advantage of being able to initially enter the plane unnoticed without an invitation, which makes this much more convenient for you, instead of waiting for a summoner to stumble across a ritual with the barest relation to you that you can hijack and answer."

I could think of a number of stories where something similar to what the Builder spirit described was used for summoning actual demons and evil gods and other terrible things into reality. Funny how I claimed to be such a god on Familiar of Zero, and now it turned out that I really would have to act in a similar manner in the future.

I spoke to the Builder a bit more, to deepen my understanding of what he'd told me, and learned how to perform a contract ritual for a threshold invitation.

The drawbacks were clear, but from what the Builder had described, a qualifying contract didn't require me to be subject to absolute obedience or any magical enforcement by the summoner.

A powerful and strong-willed host who knew and supported exactly what I was doing, commanding with clear explicit orders would grant me more access to my powers in defiance of the world to fulfill them. A host who gave broad orders and left it to me to decide how to fulfill them would grant more limited access, but still enough to keep siphoning grain at least, even if at a slower rate. And a host who I made into a puppet would provide little to no protection from the planar defenses.

The contract could also be extended to any subcontracted spiritual entities I commanded, such as Agate, Derf and the water spirits.

Once I learned how to perform such a ritual from him, I deliberated over whether I ought to return to Worm at all, given these new revelations. At some point I'd have to test and confirm whether the grain on Worm would also run out, but I had no idea how long it would take to get to that point, or if it already ran out and I'd be wasting a trip to find out.

In general, I'd have to make the most out of each trip instead of doing short re-supply runs unless I had an important strategic reason for it, and I planned to come back before the final test on the second floor, so it did feel like a bit of a waste to spend two units of grain for a roundtrip like that.

If I didn't leave now, I'd have to find a host in the Tower, but neither the Builder nor the Guardians were qualified, the former because he was not quite inside the threshold, and the latter because they lacked the strong desires qualification or any interest in forming that sort of mana bond with me.

The number of candidates that remained, who I could trust with the knowledge that I was an abnormality even more strange than an Irregular, who was strong enough to actually let me use a significant degree of power, and who would not be difficult to work with…could be counted on one hand.

The Builder spirit spoke again and drew me from my thoughts. "If you are still planning to leave this plane, I have an offer for you before you go. I am interested in collecting curiosities from other planes—powerful, unusual or unique items, especially of the mystic kind. Or things with interesting history behind them. If you bring anything of interest to me, I can trade you creation dust from my own stores. For example, your wand is something I could trade for."

"That's a bit of a tall order, don't you think? Obviously I can't trade the one I'm using to get around, and I have no idea where I'd get something quite as powerful or unique."

"Not that one, though it is indeed of interest to me if you ever acquire another. I mean the wand that carries a trace of Chaos in it and Blue affinity."

"You mean this?" I pulled out the wand I'd made with Louise's blood. That was certainly an interesting descriptor for the Void element.

"Yes. I can offer you 1 unit of creation dust for it."

"I don't know about that…seems a little low."

"That is all I will trade for it, seeing as creation dust is far more valuable, objectively speaking. I have no use for the wand besides as a novelty to collect. I would trade more for your water element spirit seed or sword with the artificial spirit."

"Hold your horses, I am not up for trade," Derflinger suddenly said, after presumably pretending to be asleep.

"Hence my offer for just the wand. You can easily replace that, can you not?" The Builder spirit asked. "It is obvious that you crafted it yourself."

"Unfortunately, I actually can't. This is from the plane where I encountered the Beast, and I can't risk returning there any time soon. I've got no other sources of blood that could imbue what you call the Blue affinity, especially at such quality."

"Unfortunate indeed. Then if you craft another stable wand that carries both Chaos and a pure primary affinity, I will offer you the same one unit for each unique combination."

"What do you mean by pure primary affinity?"

"Any basic affinity of similar strength that serves as the wand's primary affinity. By basic or pure primary I mean a foundational standard affinity in any mana differentiated magic system which is not a mixture of more basic affinities within its own system. Such as the five prime colors of the old Walkers, the four plus zero material elements, the five phases of twofold manifest, among countless others.

"What if I got a chaos wand mixed with a non-standard affinity? Or a higher order affinity?"

"You will have to bring it to me for evaluation, though non-standard affinities are not likely to be of interest, unless they are sufficiently pure. A higher order affinity may be of interest if it maintains a pure symmetry of primaries. It is the quality of balanced symmetry of chaos and purity that is interesting from an artistic view. The wand you have there is quite weak and barely stable, should you make a superior one I may consider offering more."

I thought about it some more, then made up my mind, about the trade, and about where to go next.

"Artistic view, huh? I'll keep that in mind," I said. "As for the wand, I think I'll keep it for now. As valuable as creation dust may be, my inability to replace the wand makes it more important to me right now, while my need for creation dust is not too urgent at this point. Thanks for teaching me how to safely get more before making the offer though. I will remember your help and your sincerity. I can't say that I have many principles but reciprocity is one I do abide by. It's just good business to seek mutually beneficial partners, after all. So I'll spend some effort looking for potential curiosities to bring to you whenever I come back here. Though, I wonder, would you consider trading for other things too? More knowledge, for example?"

"Perhaps. Feel free to ask me when you have something to trade, and I may consider it."

"Great. I'll be on my way then."

"Before that, you need a way to ensure you can find this plane and return here."

"I have a way, I leave behind a beacon for the spell, and it'll let me target this plane from any other."

"I believe you are mistaken. Your anchors–and your spell–are unreliable, in multiple ways. You will learn in time that the only consistent law of all creation and chaos is that there are no absolutes, nothing is perfect, and everything has flaws. But an experimental spell, cast with a device you did not create, using concepts you do not understand–there can hardly be anything less reliable than that. But that is another long topic for another day. For now, why don't you check the one you left behind in the Tower again?"

I soon found myself bewildered, then concerned. The Waypoint had disappeared. What? I hadn't even left the plane yet!

Oh damn. Suddenly I remembered, there was an important condition to these Waypoints. They needed a large and stable gravitational source to remain anchored to. Did the Tower even have such a gravitational source? It was literally a Tower, not a planet, despite how large the floors were, and it wasn't necessarily built on a planet. The gravitation was…I have no idea how that worked. Shinsoo actually became denser the higher we went, instead of the other way around if gravity was the cause of the pressure.

"I see you've noticed the problem. Your spell does not seem to be compatible with the structure of this plane. Fortunately for you, I can be your anchor instead. Simply cast the spell and I will capture your beacon. Whenever you come back here, I can send you back to your last position in the Tower or Headon."

"You're a lifesaver. Thanks, let's do it."

So I set up another Waypoint with him, and then finally went on my way.

O O O

A/N: Yes, we're really back and not just for one chapter in a year. Lol.

feauxen: It's the top of the Tower, but also kind of not. Depending on how canon ToG deals with it, there might be a physical top of the Tower as well. But in this story, that "top" happens to have another side where it shifts into the ring of deterrence. Sort of like how the "Holy Grail" is a physical wish granting device-but it can also be used as a path to the Root if you know how, as the "true" intention of the creators.

Cinder: We're not done with ToG, he'll come back shortly. This is just a small break to for some tests.

dracospikex1: Thanks :D

Noburu: I'm surprised, I thought that chapter didn't have too much going on...was it the conversation with Headon?

Guest Scififan: Thanks for the info. Yeah there's going to be various reasons why all these worlds haven't been taken over already by other planar travelers. When I talk about the planeswalkers, I don't really refer to how powerful they are, but the idea that people with access to the multiverse might easily be able to become super powerful. The fact that the planeswalkers in this story can access this part of the multiverse (or the section that the Builder is talking about in the "great tree"), but are mostly limited to their own planes in the MtG setting...something has to explain that, why they aren't all over the place, why they actually...aren't that powerful, even their magic system isn't the "true magic system", just one of the systems that the Builder knows about. Of course, the Oldwalker and modern walker already has a clear difference, but there's going to be more to it, as we see the Builder explaining. I just think that it's important in a multiverse fic that's being done seriously to always answer the question of-if multiverse travel exists, why hasn't it already been done before and MC is now getting a different sort of chance? It doesn't feel satisfying if the answer is just. oh the multiverse is infinite so they never met. I prefer the kinds of concepts we see in Dresden like you mentioned, where there are things actively defending against this. When MC gets ejected, he's getting ejected into the Ring of Deterrence first, and then from there pushed out further. So it's not an instant kill. If it were some kind of chaos entity or Planeswalker that attacked, then yeah they're going to get ejected straight out into the chaos, which is partly why there was that tear into chaos back in the very first chapter that started all this. But MC is special...for reasons explained this chapter.