Chapter 11

I think I'm going berserk

I blinked my eyes against the sudden light, and put a hand up to block out the sun. The sun? Squinting and looking around I saw we were outside overlooking a strange city in the distance. One I had never seen before, I was pretty sure. I felt odd, light in way I hadn't in a long time, and I looked around for my companions. I first looked to my right, but all I saw was a strange pair of legs, and looked up and up at whatever was standing next to me. I stumbled back a step, it seemed it was a minotaur, holding a sword as big as I was.

"Orchid, what happened?" said the figure, also looking around. "Orchid? Where are you?"

"I'm right here," I told him. "Who are you?"

"What are you talking about? And why is everyone so small?"

"I have flesh!" someone said to my left. We both looked, there was a person standing there. Red skin, small horns, dressed in leathers and with an ax at their side. He was staring at his hands with a disgusted look on his face. "Look at all this… This… Flesh stuff. It's all over me."

"I would like to inquire what exactly happened to my tail!" said an even smaller person next to the red guy. He had two daggers, a very round face with huge ears, and was spinning in a circle trying to look behind him. He eventually fell over. "My goodness!"

"Oh no," said the big one, also trying to look himself over. "My wings are tail are gone too. What's going on? Orchid? Where are you? Hanz?"

"What?" answered the guy to my left.

"...No."

"Yes," I agreed with a sigh. "Something happened to us. Something good or bad I'm not sure." I looked down at myself. I seemed to be wearing something fairly skimpy, which was never a good sign, but reaching up I felt something I hadn't felt for a hundred years. "I have hair!" I grabbed it and turned over my shoulder. "Beautiful, soft, normal, long, honest to goodness hair!" I fluffed it behind me. It was hair! Golden hair, all mine once again. Oh I can't wait to have a ponytail again, or braids, or a bun, or- huh how often do you wash hair again?

"Glad someone's having a good time."

I laughed out loud. "Of course I am, it's hair! I've missed having hair so much! And I'm not covered in rock, but soft, supple skin!" I ran my hands over my body, it was such a thrill to feel skin and not rock for once. I was used to wearing loose, baggy clothes that wouldn't catch on my protrusions, it was weird to be standing there mostly exposed but if you've got it flaunt it I must have felt when putting on such a thing. Oh I can wear the boots now! Too bad they're nowhere near me! "I feel so light- Wait, Malachite, that is you, isn't it?"

"Yeah, what have I been saying? Orchid, what is going on?"

I looked him up and down. He was minotaur sized now all right, towering over all of us. "Wow, it's a good thing I just learned the shrink spell it would never fit otherwise if you're that big."

"Orchid! You can't just say stuff like that."

I laughed again and fluffed my hair out once more. It felt so good! Everything was great!

"Everything is wrong," complained Hanz. "I can't do anything I normally can. Is this how you organic beings perceive the world? Not a fan, not a fan at all. I can't even access the zoom function!"

"Maybe I shouldn't go touching stuff," Snarly decided, getting up. "So now what?"

"I don't know," I admitted. "Are we in some kind of parallel world? Is this us in that world? I have no idea. See what we have on our person. We were all facing that city there, perhaps that's our destination? We would have been facing away from it if we had just left." I might be fine staying here but the others probably want their original forms back. But if it means going back into my old body-

"I have a note," Snarly announced, patting themselves down. "I still seem to be unable to read it though." The others were shrugging off their packs, and I realized I had one too. I felt I still had a mana core, and I remembered how to cast spells, and there seemed to be magic near us so I wasn't too worried about being defenseless. My allies were gone, as was all the stuff I had made for us. No tokens at the moment for my allies, I would be under the full weight of that magic if I needed them. Great, but one thing at a time. "Let's take a look." He handed it to me, so I unfolded it and read;

Arrys, Barnabus, Gorde, and Helvena: The Celestial Guardians thank you for your ongoing service, and the excellence with which you have accomplished the previous tasks to which you have been assigned. There is now but one step remaining in order to stave off the conjuration of the Gloom by the Twilight Syndicate: the Spirit Key, forged by the Order of Keys and held in Elgar, must be recovered and returned to us in the Obelisk. Only then can we call forth The Enlightenment, and defeat the Syndicate.

Herald

Prelate of the Celestial Guardians

"I call Arrys!" I shouted as they were digesting this.

"Huh?" Malachite managed.

"Well, I'm not Barnabus, and Gorde is right out. Snarly can be Gorde."

"Hey!"

"Helvena would be a close second, I guess."

"Never mind that," Hanz waved that away. "Do you think this city is Elgar? We have one of those, and there was an order of the keys in our world as well."

"What was it?" Snarly asked.

"A group tasked with finding and closing demon gates," he explained. "It was established long before the fall, when things like the demon world were not common knowledge. Perhaps some 8,000 years ago now. There are too many to close now, so I think the group no longer exists."

"Plus any old mage can learn magic to open a temporary gate on their own," Malachite reminded us, poking me in the arm.

"Agreed," I replied. "Also ow! I'm not made of stone anymore you know!"

"Oh I'm looking forward to it."

"Now who's saying things they shouldn't?" I asked with a snort. "And don't think I've forgiven you yet. Even if you did just what I thought you were gonna do. But back to the present. I'm familiar with the Guardians and the Syndicate. They were factions in the mage war. Is the war still going on here? I don't get it. I think our mage war lasted like 14 years? How could it be that it would still be going to the modern day?"

"Maybe it got started later here?" Snarly asked.

"Yeah, okay," I admitted.

"If this is a parallel world, their Elgar is in one piece still," Hanz went on, looking down at the city. "Our Elgar is in two pieces, blasted apart so the rumor goes. Others claim the city was just built to look like it was once connected, though they are unable to explain why anyone would go through the trouble."

"The sea of Asariel?" Malachite asked. "That's what you're talking about?"

"Exactly. A large body of water separates the two halves of the city. But as you can see, this city is in one-"

At that moment, as we looked, there was a huge flash and rumbling in the direction of the city. A few seconds later we were all knocked over as the earth buckled, wind howled, and the loudest boom we had ever heard washed over us. Snarly was curled into a ball and screaming his head off, which honestly wasn't helping anyone, though I had half a mind to follow his example. My hair is going to get all dirty!

After the earth stopped shaking and the noise died down we crawled to our feet and looked down at the place again. It was messed up. In fact half it seemed to be simply gone, a crater was all that was left.

"Nuclear weapons wouldn't even do that," Hanz breathed. "And this highlights a disturbing thought."

"What's that?" I asked, dreading the answer.

"We haven't traveled to a parallel world, we've gone back in time. I've seen that movie, it hardly ever ends well. We just witnessed the rending of the city of Elgar. If this key we're supposed to find was there, it's gone now."

"Forget that," Malachite shouted. "Imagine if we had kept going instead of stopping to figure out stuff from being changed like we were! We would have been much closer to the city when whatever happened just happened. We might be dead!"

"Do you think anyone survived that?" Snarly asked.

"I can't imagine how," I replied. "All valid concerns. Look, it's kilometers away and we can't fly anymore. Let's take a moment to take stock of what we've got. A few minutes isn't going to matter, anyone not dead down there… There won't be much even my magic can do. Plus getting close after an explosion like that, it's going to be a mess. Figure out who we are, what we have to work with, and then we can ride down there." Some kind of identification? We were supposed to get some kind of key, but I have no idea who I would ask for I don't even know the name of the body- you don't think the soul of this person went into my body, in the future, do you? Oh boy they're going to be confused…

"Right," everyone said, starting to tear though their packs.

The group as a whole didn't have much, the usual traveling gear one might expect, but no bedrolls, food, drink, or camping supplies. It wasn't much effort to discover why. We each had a ring on, and sinking into mine with my skill to synchronize showed me a spell I was familiar with- withstand weather- and one I had personal experience with but didn't need a spell for. As long as we wore the ring we wouldn't need to eat or drink. Which makes me think I don't have that ability in this body naturally. What have we really gained, after losing so much?

I also had some wooden tokens with a symbol on them, which I worked out was some analog to my spell symbol, with a shelter spell on it. So it seemed we did have to sleep, and we used that to make a small place in which to do that at night. Nothing really with our names apart from the letter, not even my book had a "property of" in the front. I leafed through it, and somewhat to my shock found it contained different spells than the ones I personally knew. So this is a different person entirely, good to know. I'm not sure what it would have meant, had they been the same. Maybe that my soul reincarnated into my time, in order to once again battle the Gloom? That would have explained a lot, from my insistence my companions keep their souls pure so I would see them again in Heaven, to why I felt the need to study so hard all those years. To relearn my spells and be able to fight. Even if I lost my memories of this life, my soul, on some level, knew. It strives to repeat my success here, even if I'm not consciously aware of it. But that theory doesn't work out for the most part, given what I see here. Oh sure, our spells would be a little different because of circumstance, but if I was a soul returned, and my mana core exists in the soul, naturally I would seek out the same spells. But this is a completely different set of them. So whoever this is, probably they are not related to me at all. But then how have I come to be here? What connects this body and mine that drew me here when Snarly touched the door? We better get a move on.

"Anything interesting?" Malachite asked, looking over my shoulder.

"If I had a few months, sure," I replied, stuffing the book back. "But this woman's handwriting is terrible, it's in her own sort of shorthand, and I'm not completely literate in Magician. I have magic for that sort of thing. I doubt I'll be able to learn any new spells from this, unless we're here for weeks at a time."

"And what would it mean if we were?" Hanz asked. "The longer we stay here, the more danger our future is in. Stepping on butterflies, and all that."

I nodded. "Yes, if we go left and they went right, it could change the entire history of our world. Or, if time simply fits together like a puzzle, our future is the way it is because we had already gone back to this time, so we can't do anything 'wrong' because the future we know is being shaped by the actions we take here, which we have already done. Thus it must be the way we remember it because it's already happened. And what does that say about free will, I wonder?"

"My head hurts," Snarly announced. "Can we just get a move on?"

"Right you are, whoever you are!" I agreed. "Horse?" I tapped my chest. "Oh crap!"

We got closer and closer to the city, or at least what was left of it. Water was indeed rushing in from the ocean to fill the void that had been created, soon it would be what people called the sea of Asariel, no doubt. I was riding, Snarly was being carried by Malachite, while Hanz had refused another casting of Athame. "I prefer to 'stretch my legs' so to speak," they told me. "Get used to having actual muscles. I may need to know my limits before long."

"It's your feet," I told them. "Let me know if you change your mind."

But they hadn't, and we approached the ruins of the city with some caution. We were coming from the south, and the city had been torn in half and flung to the north, so this part was the least damaged. There were still fires burning everywhere, collapsed buildings, sinkholes, people crying out for loved ones- it was a complete mess. But at least no one really spared us a glance, and there were no guards demanding to know why we were entering the city. I have no idea how secret their mission is, after all. These people may have a suitable cover story but we don't know what it is.

"How are we going to find anything in all this?" Malachite muttered, setting Snarly down.

"I suggest finding someone in a position of authority," Hanz decided. "Though of course I do not how how secretive the Order of the Keys was in this time. No one but a member may be aware of the key we are to retrieve and thus, be unable to help us."

"Let's just go see what the situation is, I can't just walk past all these people who need help," I announced.

"But would the person you replaced have done that?" Snarly asked.

"If I start second guessing every decision they would have made I'll never do anything. I have to think I'm in this time for a reason. Maybe because they would just ignore all this, and that leads to an even worse future. I'm here, no matter what I look like. I'll follow my own conscience."

"I expected nothing less," Malachite agreed with a grin. "At least I can probably help clear rubble like a champ now."

We moved through the city, helping where we could, healing where I could. The most heart wrenching victim was a young girl that had been playing outside. I healed the gash in her leg from being thrown around, but her house was rubble- her family was gone. With a bit of questioning we learned any other family she had lived in the northern part of town, the part that was now across an enormous divide now filling with water. Were the two halves shoved apart equally? It seemed like this part sort of stayed where it was, and the other part was shoved. That means that part of town got hit worse than this one. What a mess. We all stood there, knowing we couldn't exactly take care of a kid for reasons too numerous to list at the moment. She was just standing there crying, but what could I do? We weren't even in the right time, this had all happened hundreds of years ago. She was dead and gone in my time, how was I supposed to know what her best path was now?

"There will be many refugees," Hanz finally decided. "Many loved ones lost. Even in the past the church would be the logical first responder in a tragedy such as this one. Perhaps finding the nearest place of worship is all we can do for her. Let them do their job."

"You're probably right," I told them. I held out my hand. "Come on, little one. There's nothing for you here."

We headed further into the city, and Malachite looked at me questionably. "You seemed hesitant to do your magic, are you okay?"

I grimaced. "Mana here is… I don't even have the language to describe it. I've never felt it be anything but what it is, so it's like trying to describe a different sort of air." Actually, that could be a suitable analogy. It's less 'humid' now... "Whatever that spell was, it damaged more than just the ground. I'll be fine for now, my mana core in this body is as strong as mine is, in the future." Or is it actually my mana core, because it's in my soul? "And it seems this body can utilize external mana same as I can, so I can replace what I use. But it'll be slower. It's thin? Like trying to swim in water that won't hold you up. At first I thought it might have been caused by a chaos spell of some kind, and I would have trouble casting. Remember Snarly's cave? But it seems okay, magic is simply a little 'further away' than I'm used to at the moment."

"You're our best bet in finding anything in this mess. Let me know if you need to rest, or go back outside town. I can't fly you, obviously," he turned to show his back. "But I can carry you."

"Thanks." I paused and grinned. "Big guy."

There was already a line when we made it to the largest church, dodging collapsed buildings and streets on the way. We made the girl get in line, the others explaining or at least trying to explain her new situation to her. I hurried to help those I could, feeling my healing magic was going to get a workout today. I was in the middle of healing a man when several guards rushed up to me.

"Hold it there!" the one in the lead cried out. "What do you think you're doing?"

"Helping cut this line down," I replied, not really looking at them. "Anyone that just needs healing I can handle myself, and they won't need to go into the church. We're all going to need to pitch in to recover from this tragedy." There wasn't a mage's guild yet, was there? No, I think it was set up after the war, to try and avoid another. So no one will be coming after this body insisting 'she' should have changed for the healing. Stupid guild. Stupid war!

"You a scholar?"

I rolled my eyes. "Of course I'm a scholar. You think if I was a natural and part of the attack I would be here healing these people?"

"Yeah, go bother someone else!" one of the crowd called. "She's been helping, I don't see you helping anyone!"

"Protect the scholars, down with the naturals!" another cried. Others took up the chant.

"She's got a point," one of the guards whispered to the other. "And we can easily check. If she exhausts herself trying to heal these people we know she's lying."

"Fine, we're watching you." He backed off and started trying to get an orderly line formed back up again.

"What was that all about?" Malachite asked, coming over to stand next to me.

"It's this war- more accurately people being dumb- over the 'type' of magic user you are. Hold still." I started casting my minor healing spell, cursing Solara for not having the vitality magic I had hoped to get. No means to get it here, either, unless it had been discovered in this time, lost, and then rediscovered in my time.

"Thank you," said the man, when I was done healing him. "I'll make it count, go and help where I can. Blessing upon you, magus. Together I'm sure we can get through this."

"I know we can," I replied. He bowed and moved off.

"Type?" Malachite pressed.

"I'll give you a brief run down it's something everyone in this time would know. It would be suspicious if you didn't." I turned to him. "As stupid as it sounds, this was the cause of the war..."