LOCATION: PORTAL TECHNOLOGY GROUP
AREA: ASHEN CITY, NOCTURNUS
STARDATE: 4205771x235 | TIME: EARLY MORNING
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System Message:
The following events occurred outside the area observed by the System. This historical Record was reconstructed from a memory archive voluntarily released after the subject Trevor Gant’s return.
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Nearly two hundred days passed on Nocturnus. During that time, Trevor worked closely with Kallus every day. There were no weekends on Nocturnus. No vacations or holidays.
It turned out that Kallus was many things.
He was brilliant, to start.
He was brutal and efficient.
And most of all, behind all of that, he was a pragmatic narcissist, coldly playing with human lives as if they were so many grains of sand. He was always angling for the next discovery that would boost his own career further.
But one thing Trevor had to admit was that Kallus was willing to share the limelight. Just a little bit. He took most of it for himself, of course, but he occasionally allowed a bit of it to shine on his team.
Most of the portal technology the Empire deployed was developed by Kallus and a hand-selected group he had been teaching and managing for thousands of years by this point.
On this particular morning, Trevor whispered with Tin before he left for work, as was their custom.
They never spoke the important bits loudly, knowing there was always the chance of being overheard by neighbors or Black Guard members.
More than once, Trevor had caught a member of the Black Guard standing below one of his windows eavesdropping.
Trevor burst out the front door and scolded the man, threatening to report him to Kallus. He had to keep up the image of the arrogant prodigy, but he also took the warning.
Trevor leaned in and took Tin’s hand as they spoke.
“Replenish the wine and food today,” Trevor whispered. “Things are going to get intense for the next ten days, and I would prefer for you to not be on the streets any more than needed. Okay?”
Tin nodded.
The bell sounded out across the city.
“Well,” Trevor said loudly. “Time to leave to work. How do I look?”
Tin blushed and straightened his robe a bit at the shoulders.
“You look handsome, my lord. Be safe today.”
They had taken to making a show of an affectionate relationship. Which, after two hundred days together, wasn’t entirely an act.
Trevor had grown fond of Tin’s quiet ferocity, always bubbling just beneath her impeccably calm exterior.
He kissed her on the cheek and stepped out the front door.
One of the Black Guard members on the corner asked if he required an escort and Varris waved him off, grumbling just loud enough to be heard about nuisances first thing in the morning.
He arrived at Portal Tech, and Kallus was uncharacteristically jovial.
“I hear you’re getting along well with Tin Shale,” he said. “If you should decide you’re ready to produce offspring, let me know. I can approve it without going through the usual channels.”
Trevor smiled, hiding his surprise at the suddenly intimate conversation.
“Thank you, Master. I am okay for now. Far too focused on our work at the moment to be distracted by such trivialities.”
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Kallus laughed and clapped Varris on the back.
“Of course you are! Good thing, too. Today we’re working on a new project. I’ve decided to assign you to it, due to your… special circumstances.”
Magister Kallus often referred to Varris’s massive mana pool in such ways. It turned out that mages in the Empire were artificially capped at 10,000 mana. Kallus himself received an exemption, but his mana pool was just a little over 15,000.
Kallus had asked Varris many times how he got around the restrictions, but Varris only smiled and said he had promised not to tell.
This, of course, only made Kallus more curious. He had sent inquiries back to the Empire on many occasions but all came back with nothing.
Varris was a ghost in a bureaucracy that tracked everything. That could only mean one thing. He must be from an extremely powerful family or lineage.
And Kallus, with his endless appetite for upward mobility, decided to make sure that his new protégé would sing his praises to the powers that be.
“This is a project I’ve been developing on my own,” Kallus continued. “I’ve been toiling away at it for two centuries and haven’t told a soul. But today, I think it’s almost ready for the first test.”
Varris nodded, stepping closer to the desk. Kallus handed him a tablet with a schematic for a device. Varris began zooming in and out at different portions of it.
“This is a truly inspired design, Master.”
Kallus scoffed.
“Of course it is. Now, just to be sure we’re on the same page, let me go through the concept behind it.”
He had taken Varris into his private office and closed the door.
“As you know, our normal large-scale portals require six mages to operate. They feed their own mana into the devices and stabilize the field, but it’s the devices that keep the portal open, along with the vast resources it takes to do so.”
Varris nodded, and Kallus continued.
“That’s all fine for planned incursions. But we currently have no way to set up portals in case of emergencies. And this tech will help make it happen.”
Varris studied the drawings again. There were two pads in the shape of human hands.
“The pads here—”
“Yes,” Kallus said. “The operator sets up the device and places his hands there. Their entire mana pool will be drained, but they will be able to create an instant bridge to another place.”
“Where are the controls?” Varris asked.
“There are none.”
“Then how do you program the destination?”
“That’s where the brilliance lies, my student. The device taps directly into the operator’s mind. You must know the exact spatial coordinates, but it will calculate the destination, open the field, create the bridge, and shut down safely behind.”
Trevor didn’t let the smile on his face waver as Kallus studied him. But deep down, he was concerned.
Allowing one of Kallus’s devices access to his mind was dangerous. The number of things that could go wrong were almost impossible to count.
His identity, for one. His Hollow Mantle class. All the secrets his mind housed like a steel trap, laid bare to this icon of the Obsidian Empire?
Because Trevor knew that Kallus had been trying to uncover his true identity for a long time. And he had to assume that this emergency portal wasn’t a portal at all, but just a way to pry loose secrets Trevor was holding.
“This is an incredible development, Magister Kallus. Where do we begin?”
That day, Trevor realized two things.
First, it was possible to create an emergency portal with a single mage, as long as that mage had a large enough mana pool. That part of Kallus’s explanation was not a ruse.
When Trevor looked over the schematics, Varris’s perfect recall recorded every single detail. He knew he could build this device himself. Most of the parts were fabricated and lying around the shop. He did some mental calculations. It would take only two days to do. One and a half if he rushed.
The second thing Trevor learned that day was that Magister Kallus had to die before Trevor could leave this world.
The man was simply far too dangerous to be left alive. Nobody allowed near him would ever dare to even conceive of such a thing: killing one of the Empire’s heralded heroes.
But Trevor knew he would have to. It would not only help to cover his tracks when he fled Nocturnus, but it would strike a massive blow to the Empire.
Two birds, one stone.
He made up his mind and began forming a plan.
When Trevor got home that evening, he waited patiently as he and Tin ate dinner and split a bottle of wine.
Later, they went to bed.
Once they had become intimate, Tin had taken to sleeping together with Trevor every night. The warmth of the gentle woman was soothing to him, especially after having to be the cold, calculating Varris all day long.
Nestled together, their arms and legs intertwined under the sheets, Trevor began telling her his plan. In low whispers, he outlined it all for her.
“It will take some time to prepare, but I’m going to build the machine. The bridge will provide just enough space for the two of us to escape. Once I make it through, I will collapse the origin field, and the entire Portal Tech building will implode, taking a sizeable part of the Upper District along with it.”
“You’ll take me with you?”
Trevor kissed her cheek.
“Of course, Tin. How could I not? You have been the only source of happiness I have known in this dark world.”
“But what about the others?” she asked.
“The Upper District can burn for all I care,” Trevor said. He knew it was callous, but the people who inhabited this part of town were among the worst.
“No,” Tin said. “The others on Shale Street and the rest of the lower town. They will be punished. We have to save them, too.”
Trevor was quiet, trying to think of a way.
Something in the back of his mind, the influence of Varris, kept telling him it was an unnecessary risk.
He wanted to say that. But Trevor’s heart fought the urge.
“Let me see what I can do. Okay? We still have some time to figure it out.”
Tin whispered a quiet thank you before she fell asleep, safe in his arms.