Chapter 35

“We will never truly understand the aions. We can interpret their actions, and we can interpret the information that they deliberately left for us, but we will never know them. Not in the way that we might know one of our contemporaries. The image that we have of the aions is based on the history that they chose to preserve for us. History may be written by the victors, but their history was written entirely by them and may be just as self-serving. It may seem as if the fragments that we have acquired through our explorations of the vaults that allowed us to pull together our image of the precursor species we named aions were accidental. Things that they left behind by accident, which we can use to extrapolate the little that we know, but this is not the case. Every word that we have read was chosen for us to read. For this reason, among others, there is great distrust of the aion vaults as primary sources of information. There is a widespread cynicism regarding the aions, their history and beliefs. 

Many believe that they may have been no ‘holier’ than we are, committing the same atrocities that our contemporary species have and then rewriting their history to hide the unpleasant truth. This may be the case, but I would argue that even if it is a fiction provided to us, that fiction speaks more to the truth of the aions and what they valued than anything else. The very fact that they considered those parts of their history shameful enough to expunge tells us everything about who the aions were at the point of their extinction. A people who centered morality above all else. So when you ask about the significance of the vaults, what the aions meant when they prepared them, remember this: they could have preserved their entire culture in them. They could have used their incredible power, and incredible minds, to find a way to throw themselves into the future and escape from the crisis that drove them into extinction, but instead, they chose to create a lifeboat for the rest of us. They chose to die but leave behind every tool that we would need to ensure our survival. The significance of the vaults is love. The aions, above all else, loved us so much that they used all that they had left to save us.”

—The Vaults and Their Significance, Kalisdrothan Vaelhathan

The air was still and stale inside the vault. By Sylvas’ estimations, it should have been downright toxic after so long sealed shut, but whatever magic had kept the place impervious throughout all of history had also kept the inevitable from happening inside. They walked in but also down; there was a steep incline, leading them deeper into the vault. The moment that they were inside, the sound of battle was already muffled, and with each step that they took, it seemed to fade further and further. The deeper into the vault they went, the more the scene of battle behind them vanished from sight, until there was only a glimpse of sky traced over with shots of magic and flitting eidolons, and then not even that.

There was a bone-deep cold to the place that Sylvas would not have predicted to go along with the staleness and the stillness. As if the aions had actually frozen it, not only in time, putting the whole place on ice. Sylvas fully expected it to get colder the deeper in that they went, but it remained at a constant chill. The walls lit up as they proceeded, lines carved into the ancient stone illuminating their way. Rania had been very restrained up until that moment, and then she finally let Sylvas go and darted over to examine the patterns engraved there, giddy with her excitement. It brought a smile to Sylvas’ face despite everything.

“It isn’t writing like we found at the other sites. Or maybe it is a completely novel language of aion… I wish I had a proper crew to document all this…”

“You’ll have plenty of time after.” Sylvas chuckled.

“Yeah, right.” She rolled her eyes. “Like you aren’t going to explode the whole place or something. I know you too well, Sylvas Vail.”

“There’s nobody left to try and use it against us…” He trailed off as that thought shook him. “All our enemies are gone. It’s just… us.”

Rania tore herself away from the wall. “And the eidolons.”

Sylvas headed off down the passage once more. “Not for long.”

As they descended, the new language or art or whatever it was that had been splayed across the walls and roof glowed brighter, until by the time that they reached the innermost chamber of the vault, the space was as bright as a midsummer day. Parts of it were recognizable to Sylvas now: words of aion, fragments of spellforms, and more, all blended together into some sort of aesthetic whole. Rania had been right about the danger of booby traps and radiation. The aions had left everything in here completely safe for whoever came along.

The chamber floor was marked as the walls had been, but those markings and circles did not light up, not yet anyway. The patterns were etched into the rock, but those engravings had been filled with etherium. When mana was fed through them, he had no doubt the whole thing would glow, just like the walls had. As they moved into the chamber, Sylvas was afflicted with a moment of vertigo, or possibly just a strike of déjà vu so potent that it rocked him on his feet. He knew the spell that they were walking over.

Back home on Croesia, he had devoted months of his life to learning the magic of the sacred scroll of the Harbingers of the Hollow Heart. He had studied it meticulously, and while he hadn’t yet gained the paradigm that would grant him his eidetic memory, he could still recall it perfectly. It had been burned into his mind by his endless study, and then it had been burned into his body. He looked down at the scars covering his body, the curls and shapes of spellforms that he’d held in place for too long, searing his flesh, permanently disfiguring him. The scars that had only spread with each eidolon he formed a covenant with, until now, when they stretched over his entire body. The final part of the spell inscribed on the ground was inscribed on his flesh. He was the missing component that would activate it.

“Can you understand any of this?” Rania’s voice startled him.

“It’s a summoning spell.” Mira was saying the same thing in his mind as he expressed it out loud. “The whole thing. It is just one giant summoning spell.”

“To summon what?” Rania’s brows drew down in confusion. “The weapon?”

“Eidolons.” He paced around the circle on the ground, recognizing most of the basic structure of the spell even without Mira’s running commentary, but locking in on specific pieces that were different from the summoning that he had learned so long ago. All of the limiters were missing. All of the restraints that would stop the caster from burning through all their mana and cut the spell off before its reach extended too far. It was a limitless summoning. “It will summon every eidolon across all planes of existence to this one. To this exact spot.”

Rania was very careful not to step into the circle on the floor, trailing around the walls, trying to make sense of what was written and drawn there. To use her expertise to help somehow. She dragged her gaze back to Sylvas. “And then it kills them?”

There was nothing else. The spell did what it did. It would rip every eidolon in the universe and beyond away from where they were and drop them directly on this single point in space. Right at the center of the circle, where Sylvas would need to stand to activate the spell.

You’re meant to just kill them as they arrive?

“There is nothing here that will kill an eidolon. Nothing but the summoning.”

She looked around the chamber. “The walls, they’re made of the same material as the other vaults. Is the idea to squeeze them all in and crush them?”

You’re considerably more fragile than an eidolon, darling, and without you, the spell is incomplete, so that can’t be it.

He moved across the old familiar pattern on the floor, looking for something, anything that might explain the purpose of the spell. Was it inverted in some way to banish the eidolons away from this point and beyond all known space to such a distance that they’d starve to death from the lack of mana before ever reaching it? Was there some deliberate fault in the summoning that would result in them being damaged in transit by some sort of portal slicing? Was this some sort of meta-spell that would render all future summoning spells incapable of touching eidolons? It was none of the above. “No. I don’t… I don’t understand.”

I don’t understand either, darling, and that is considerably more surprising. It doesn’t make any sense. Why summon them all here? What possible purpose does it serve, other than to make every eidolon in the universe the problem of one tiny planet trapped between two black holes? Is this meant to be a prison for them?

There was a precision to the spell that had been missing in the original that Sylvas had tried to cast, dooming his world. A focus on the exact output position of the spell and the portal it would open.

“It doesn’t just summon them here, as in, the planet. It summons them here.” He stalked over to the center of the design without stepping into it. “This exact spot at the center. Where I need to stand. And then it…binds it there.”

Rania turned away from the walls and looked at Sylvas. “Oh. No.”

Has she worked it out before us? If she has, I don’t know that I’ll ever forgive her.

Sylvas crept across to her. She looked so spooked by whatever idea had just popped into her head that he was worried that approaching directly might spook her. “Oh no, what?”

“The aions. They… The thing that confused me about all of this was that the aions never chose to kill. It was like it never even occurred to them that it was an option.” She turned to face Sylvas, looking miserable. “They didn’t even try to destroy the eidolons. So why would they leave a weapon behind that could do it?”

Sylvas cast his hands out in frustration. “They didn’t.”

“No, they didn’t. They wouldn’t. They’d make a prison.”

“You can’t imprison eidolons. You can hold them for a while, with great care. Then they break out and rampage. You can’t strand them on a planet, because they’d just destroy it and move on to the next one. You can’t even strand them in another plane of existence, because they tear through reality to get back at the magic they want.”

“You can control them. Isn’t that what the covenant is? A mage controlling an eidolon?”

“No. That’s… no.” Realization dawned on him. “Oh no.”

This vast spell, this complex apparatus built millennia before. It had been designed to bring every eidolon to this one point in space. To the one thing that could contain them.

He said it out loud, just to be sure he wasn’t going crazy. “I’m the prison. I will be the prison. For every single one out there…and every single one that comes to be afterwards.”

“When you formed a second covenant, that should have told us everything we needed to know. And then again, in the fighting, you—”

“I can do it,” he realized with a shock. “I can do this.”

“I don’t know if you can.” Rania was shaking her head. 

At the rate the eidolons will be arriving, we won’t have the time to match their emotional state and ensure a covenant forms.

“I’ll have to fragment. Break up my mind into smaller parts to handle each eidolon, process them fast, and I’ll have to…” He groaned. “I’ll have to take down the paradigm that blocks the emotions I don’t want. I’ll need to feel everything if I’m going to match them.”

The dismay was a little too obvious on Rania’s face. “Your mind—”

“It will hold.”

And through the star-soul, we have sufficient mana of all types to feed to the new arrivals, and after a certain point, sheer weight of numbers will be on our side. The bonded eidolons can simply dogpile the new arrivals until they’re civilized.

Sylvas cupped Rania’s face in his hands and pressed a gentle kiss to her lips before drawing back and smiling. “I can do this.”

“I wish you didn’t have to.” Rania took a step back and pushed him towards the center of the circle. “Good luck.”

“I don’t need luck.” Sylvas smiled. “This is how it was always meant to be.”

The scars across his body began to glow as he approached the center of the vault. Mana spreading out through him from his core, as if it was being called. The perfection of the completed spell did call out to him. It made sense. He was the missing piece. At the moment that he stepped into the center, every channel that had ever been cut through his body—by his intention, or by the wounds he’d borne—lit up and flooded with power. 

His arms spread out, rising of their own volition, until every line of scar and etherium below lined up, completing the pattern. Completing the spell. He didn’t have to say a word. He didn’t have to will the ancient apparatus into life. He just had to let it happen.

The world shook around him, and he had no idea if it was an earthquake, some gravity disruption he was causing, or all in his head. He couldn’t turn his head to look at Rania. Couldn’t do much of anything except let the spell that he was a part of be cast.

Brace for impact. The first ones should be the closest, and the closest one should be…

With a horrible sense of chill radiating out from it, Sylvas felt the portal open. What he hadn’t realized, despite all of his focus on where the eidolons would be arriving, was that the portal would open up inside of him. 

More specifically, it opened up in his core, into the star-soul that was now a part of him. The biggest and most delicious treat that any eidolon had ever seen. He hadn’t really thought too hard about how he could encourage eidolons towards him before that moment, and now he couldn’t help but feel a little vulnerable that he was literally opening up a portal inside himself and inviting the whole universe in.

The first eidolon to hit was a small one, barely even a Tier 2, the sort of thing that Sylvas used to slap around on Strife before he had his third circle. It was an eidolon of war, bladed and jagged—and extremely uncomfortable to swallow as a result—but finding the same emotions that drove it came all too easily to Sylvas. 

Whatever else he had become, he was a warrior; he had the same hunger for battle and victory as this thing, so it became a part of him without him needing to think twice. After that first one, things became considerably more complicated. A dozen hit at the same time, and Sylvas had to fragment his mind, while still giving each fragment enough access to his main mind to be able to pull down all the emotional blockades he’d thrown up over the years, so his trauma and suffering didn’t drive him crazy.

That isn’t going to work, darling. We need the full breadth of your horribly messed-up little mind for this to work.

He knew that she was right, but he barely had time to register it before the next wave of eidolons hit. Bigger ones, more powerful. Not as powerful as the ones he already contained, but powerful enough that one with a storm affinity made his hair briefly stand on end, and a fire affinity one had him belching out smoke. He couldn’t react fast enough, break off fragments quickly enough. He had to shatter. He had to let his whole mind come apart and trust in every part of it to come back when the job was done. 

All the walls that he’d built in his mind with his paradigms, he tore down in one fell swoop. He felt it all. All the pain. All the despair. The rage that he’d fought so hard to keep quiet so it didn’t swallow him up and make him a monster. He let them all out to play, and every feeling found its match among the eidolons. Everything that he’d held back was welcome. It began to blur together almost immediately. There was so little of his mind left intact, and so many eidolons flooding into him, more and more and more with each passing moment. 

There weren’t enough fragments of his mind to catch them all. They began to pile up. To block the portal. He was failing. He was ruining this. This perfect solution, built just for him, and he was screwing it all up. He wasn’t good enough. Wasn’t smart enough. Hadn’t worked hard enough. Hadn’t broken himself into small enough pieces.

The eidolons came flooding in by the hundreds every moment. With each heartbeat, a world’s worth of monsters thundered into the center of him. 

The first eidolon that he’d absorbed from the portal faded away into his core to join the others he had already bound. That fragment snatched up the next eidolon of war and poured the same emotion into it, the same fierce rage and pride. The eidolons within him had been stilled when this all began, crushed down and silenced so that he could focus, but now they bucked and swirled. They could sense the other eidolons, and what resonated through him wasn’t the territorial anger he had expected. It was excitement. 

New friends to frolic with in the pasture of your soul.

It was nice that even in the chaos, Mira still had the time to make sarcastic comments. He undid what little restraint he had over the eidolons and set them loose. They leapt out to grab at the new arrivals. Wrestling the ones that wouldn’t readily submit to Sylvas will, inviting in the ones that were happy to be sublimated. 

To Sylvas’ amazement, more than half of the eidolons that were being summoned were the happy kind. He didn’t have to engage with them at all, didn’t have to feed them any particular stream of emotion to merge with them, or any particular mana to entice them.

The eidolons shifted inside him, flocking together and shifting in waves like birds in flight. More and more still came pouring in, but Sylvas no longer had the fragments of his mind intercepting them. He let them in, and they sought out their own kind, and their own place. They drank of his mana and found safe refuge in his soul, and finally, finally, he saw the aion’s vision for what the Starbreaker would be. 

Not a warrior, or a genius, or anything else that he’d thought he needed to be to succeed and save his friends. He had spent his entire life following the course that fate had laid out for him, and it had made him into a home. A safe place for creatures that had never known one. He was a sanctuary, and the eidolons coming to him now were not being dragged in kicking and screaming. They wanted to be there; they wanted to be with each other. They wanted to be with him.

As they latched onto the star-soul, and he fed them all the mana that they needed to sustain them, he realized that all this time the reason he had such ease in forming bonds with the eidolons despite declaring them his enemy was that they shared the same most basic nature. 

They were hungry, just as he was. 

They needed something that they had no way to get without fighting for it. He couldn’t believe that it had taken him so long to make the connection. To realize that in this, he and the eidolons were the same, and so they were always seeking to align themselves with him.

The eidolons that he had been summoning by brute force came now of their own volition, the whole purpose of the spell, the vaults, all of it, forgotten now that they had someone to call home. The universe had been picked clean of them, and now only those titanic eidolons too slow and powerful to pass through into this universe during incursions were left behind, being dragged back from the universe where they had been imprisoned to merge with him.

His mind melted away entirely as they made contact with him, these last ancient eidolons that had existed since before any of this. Before the aions. Before magic was ever anything other than their sustenance. 

All the mental fragments melded back into him, but the memories and sensations that he had unleashed on himself and the endless storm of emotion from the eidolons was overwhelming. These ancient eidolons that had lived since before the stars were lit had experienced so much, and it was all becoming a part of him now. Every one of the hundreds of them that he dragged through into this world was so much bigger than him, in terms of their mass, their power, and most importantly, their memory. His awareness, his consciousness, all faded into the burning white rush of sensation. 

His perfect memory recorded nothing more.