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    1. Prodigal Son 9 yrs ago

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9 yrs ago
Current These things I have spoken unto you, that in me you might have peace. In the world you shall have tribulation: but be of good cheer; I have overcome the world. -John 16:33
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9 yrs ago
If you take my memes, then you owe me.

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Felix listened to Travis's proposal, and was quite pleasantly surprised when he brought up the Sapir-Whorf hypothesis. There was something to be said about environmental development, and language was indeed a part of the environment. Of course, this was not the first time Felix had heard about this hypothesis, it was the basic foundation of high runic formula crafting. The more languages a mage understood, the more powerful he was at crafting runes, that is essentially what it amounted to. Felix snapped his fingers, "Travis, I must say that you are a genius. Each language has a structure of rules specific to its composure. Because of this fact, certain languages are more efficient than others. In terms of written language, this is especially true. What you said gave me an idea, though it isn't exactly along the same lines as your idea. I am not dismissing your idea, mind you. But just entertain me for a moment. Because of my past as a member of the Church, I am most proficient in Latin and Greek. I also know some hebrew and aramaic. The problem with Latin and Greek in written form is that it is not exactly space efficient. They both have the same problem that English does. Each character in the written language corresponds to a certain short sound, and the composure of both is of consonants and vowels. Very efficient. Ancient hebrew, however was only composed of consonants, leaving it up to the writer's elaboration, or in most cases, the reader's interpretations to discern a meaning of a text. It made it much more efficient but also much more contextual. Precision is everything in ancient hebrew spell crafting. One small clerical error could prove fatal. It was not until later that these simple letterings were enhanced through the addition of small dots and lines underneath and above the already established characters to denote vowel pronunciation and hard and soft consonants, it gave their language its much needed context. Of course, since the already established letters were denoted with small dots and dashes for context, the efficiency of the language is still very much so intact."

Felix stopped his diatribe, and took a moment to collect his thoughts. He felt like he was rambling, and knew it was because of the fatigue he was experiencing. Felix was glad that Travis offered to make more coffee. The coffee pot was next to the miniature refrigerator which was sitting on a wall-mounted counter top next to the large laboratory sinks at the west side of the room. They were currently sitting on the east side of the room. The minifrige had all manner of coffee creamers with different flavors. Felix liked his with Italian sweet creme flavored creamer.

Felix walked over to the new pot of coffee with his empty cup in hand and began to carefully concoct his coffee how he liked it: 3/4's of the cup with black coffee and the rest with Italian sweet creme creamer. He sat back down and took a long gulp of the hot liquid, tears forming in his eyes from the almost dangerous temperature of the new coffee. He slammed his cup down and let out a sigh of relief, "Come to me caffeine, you sweet but cruel mistress." Felix said aloud as he stretched his arms out. "As I was saying. hebrew is pretty efficient when it comes ot runic creation. Unfortunately, i am not very proficient in the usage of hebrew, and I think there is a better way still. I am not that proficient in any asian languages, the only one I understand roughly is Japanese. While I do understand the writing structure of Japanese better than I understand actually speaking the language, I know enough to understand that if used properly, analytic logograms such as Japanese kanji or Chinese hanzi tend to be very efficient and precise, especially in rune crafting. Perhaps we could look at a few of these languages and craft a rune using one of these more efficient languages." Felix finished expositing his idea, taking a large swig of his coffee once more. The effect of the caffeine was certainly taking effect. The warm feeling of an increased heart rate gave Felix a second wind, although it was more like a sixth wind at this point.




Raiya drained her bath, and got dressed. Her mind couldn't put down the call she just had. She continued to turn it over and over in her head until it began to frustrate her. Eventually Raiya decided to pay a visit to her old penthouse early. She took her time to construct a long distance transportation portal, with a variation of a well-known kanji rune spell 輸 the kanji for transport. After a portal opened up, she stepped through to the warm light of her old penthouse where Tsukihi was now commanding Raiya's gang in her stead. The penthouse seemed fairly empty, and, because the portal dropped her right at the massive fully stocked bar, Raiya decided to take a moment to craft herself a long island iced tea. Raiya took a shot of each component as she mixed, drinking a shot of triple-sec, white rum, gin and tequila, before actually mixing the ingredients together in a separate cup. She sat down at the bar after concocting her cocktail, and began to feel the effects of all the alcohol she just downed. It had been a while since she had drank that much, so the effects of the large amount of liquor she imbibed took hold much quickly than anticipated.

Raiya set her head down on the bar and let the effect of the depressant take hold. Her face felt flushed and her hands and feet felt warm. She was enjoying her drunken state a little too much when Tsukihi snuck up behind Raiya and placed her hand on her shoulder which startled Raiya to the point where she almost fell off of her stool. "Ma'am..." Tsukihi said in a concerned voice, "Ah thought you were coming in the morning." She added. "I was... I'm just... I couldn't ignore what you said. So I came to see if you heard anything else." Tsukihi sat down at the stool directly right of Raiya. "Affirmative, ma'am but you ain't gunna like it." Tsukihi pulled out the inlaid mana crystal from her dial and placed the flat end on the bar-top. She tapped the blue half-sphere a few times before a holographic video scene began to play before them scaled down to 1/16th of the original size of the event. "We have this new technology that allows us to take latent mana-waves of an area where recent events have taken place and reconstruct a rough simulation of what happened based on the echoing mana-waves. This is what happened." The dealers were standing around a barrel-fire like usual, the whole scene was in a pale blue tint, and the smaller details of the people were absent. Their faces were blank slates, but the rough shape of the clothing that they wore could be seen. The dealers that were around the barrel-fire all wore hoodies instead of their gang-jackets. The police would not mess with them regardless, but making the dealers look like the regular homeless population helped keep things more inconspicuous. The seen progressed until a large figure, about 6' from what Raiya could tell, entered the scene. He was wearing what looked like a suit, his hair was slicked back, though Raiya could not tell the color. He walked swiftly up to the dealers surrounding the barrel, and in an instant, with his bare fists, proceeded to kill and or wound all three of the dealers. The first one took a hard punch to the face, and then was instantly picked up and dumped into the barrel of fire. The second two received punches to the neck, crumpling in unconscious piles. The figure then leaned down to pick up the three paper bags of narcotics that the dealers had by their feet. He eventually walked out of scene.

"Wait, so this can show us where he is right now then, right?
Let's go teach this punk not to fuck with the Crux gang."
Raiya said angrily. "Sorry ma'am, but the technology takes two hours to render a scene like the one you saw, and it can only be used to capture a 15 foot square area. This is only meant to show us what happened not tell us where the guy went." Tsukihi explained. Damnit! So we have no leads at all?
What about our guys in the police department, or at the morgue? These dealers were all mages how could they be taken out by a punch like that?"
Raiya's frustration was only exasperated by her drunken state. "Our guys at the police department do not know anything who did this. He seems to be new around. The morgue only confirmed what we already knew, our guys were taken down by brute force and nothing else. That guy, whoever he is, he's strong. But we did find something interesting, residual magic waves from a spell on each of the bodies. It appears that this guy was enhancing his punches with magic." Tsukihi explained.

Raiya downed the last of her drink and slammed the glass down on the bar. "So is there no good news at all then?" Raiya asked in a pleading tone. "Well, we have increased security detail on all of our dealers. And we have placed surveillance around every drop and pickup point. If he attempts this again, we will catch him." Tsukihi replied. She then snapped her fingers, a brief flare of red flames signifying the conjuring from Tsukihi's mana inventory, after the flames dissipated, Three boxes of specialty made .45 ACP rounds each containing 50 rounds sat in the place where the flames once were. "Go back to whatever duty you have obliged yourself to, and take these. Don't worry yourself over this, ma'am, we've got this under control." Raiya waved her hand over the rounds, depositing them into her mana inventory with a flair of pink electricity. She then turned around and stepped off the stool. Raiya placed her hand on Tsukihi's left shoulder. "You're a good friend,
and a good substitute leader. Thanks for being patient with me."
Raiya spoke softly before leaving through the portal she still had open.

The portal closed behind her with a sharp electrical sound. She was back in her room at Manor De Felix. These recent revelations and her empty stomach had placed Raiya into a particularly bad mood. Raiya went downstairs to fix herself a simple sandwich, and another stiff drink. Standing at the counter-space she busied herself with putting together a rough dinner.

(For reference it is currently 8:00 PM at Felix's Manor.)
Felix felt like he was beginning to understand Travis as a person. Someone who was focused solely on the betterment of his craft, throwing all caution to the wind in order to increase his skill. While Felix had hoped Travis would eventually find more reason to stay and help the team, Felix could not blame Travis. In many ways, Travis reminded Felix of himself when he was younger; starving for knowledge, and jumping at the chance to prove himself.

Felix grinned, "Well, in the paraphrased words of Saint Marher, 'time and tide wait for no man!'" Felix said indicating that he was ready to start their research at that very moment.

About 3 Months Later: August 15th 2016


Felix stretched his arms out above his head as he yawned, his yawn echoing off of the white walls of the underground laboratory. What was it at this point? It had to be around 50 hours since Felix last got any decent amount of sleep. They spent months attempting to figure out a process to restore Felix permanently, to no avail. However, in the process, they did inadvertently find a way to reestablish the ley-lines of the paragons within the first month of their research. While the spell they came up with could fix the dud paragons they had in their possession, it did absolutely nothing to help Felix with his personal predicament. However, what was keeping Travis and Felix up so late recently is that they had been testing various runic formulae attempting to condense the large runic circle that surrounded the manor that kept Felix in stasis. The idea was actually Travis’. A few days ago the duo were at their wits’ end when suddenly in a split moment, as if lightning struck, Travis suggested they use a mobile version of something like what Felix had set up around the manor.

Many hurdles stood in their way, though. The first being that the rune Felix used was hardly space efficient, it took up about twenty percent of the radius of effect the circle had, which was about 200 square feet. The second being that the rune itself ran off of the latent mana energy that flowed from the gigantic geographical ley-line. The reason Felix had chosen the location he did for constructing his manor was solely because of the natural flow of mana that he could tap into for the rune. So not only was the current rune not space efficient, but it also was not mana efficient either. Fortunately for Felix, one of Travis’ specialties was condensing runic formulae and making spells more efficient. Even with Travis’ help, though, their project was a daunting one.

The duo set out at first by making a rough conceptual sketch. They outlined how the system would theoretically work. They knew that in order for it to be mobile, it would need an energy source, they also knew that in order to prevent a feedback loop, they could not use Felix as a source of this energy, directly or indirectly through a mana crystal. Which left them first with the task of creating a rechargeable mana crystal that naturally fed off of the latent ley line energy at their headquarters. This was truly the easiest part of the project, inscribing a runic program upon a mana-crystal was a fairly common magical practice. What they did not expect, however, was to be roadblocked by so many problems in the actual runic formula of the spell itself. Felix leaned back in his office chair, as he used his mana to turn the air in front of him into a chalk board. He swished his index finger around, jotting down a specific line in the formula that they had come at a halt on.

“The greek, “στάση” for stasis is probably the most efficient foundational incantation, but the linking stasis to the directive of my mana-well is not so easy. I used many various redundancies in the incantation around the grounds of the house. Even if it wasn’t the most efficient method, it is the most surefire method to ensure the rune will accomplish the desired effect. Also, redundancies strengthen a spell, making it more powerful than normal. The problem, is that we don’t always have room for redundancies. So, efficiency-wise we have to be extremely careful with our wording. Our runes must be extremely precise.” Felix thought out loud as he drew out a few rough ideas. Eventually he grew frustrated and waved his arm at the floating mana, dissipating it into a blue smoke-like vapor that faded away. “Please tell me you are having better luck than me,” Felix pleaded.

Before Travis could answer, a loud whirring sound accompanied by a deep blue flash of light interrupted them. The new wooden door in the back of the lab opened, as Raiya stepped out of the steaming room. After Travis and Felix restored the paragon of Fantasia to normal, they both figured out how to prevent the paragon from pulling an entire area into its illusory world. By constructing a different room near the lab and inscribing that room with a set of domain-border runes, the paragon treated the room as a full bounded space. Only those who entered the room would be pulled into the paragon constructed dimensional-field. They also figured out through trial testing, that the paragon of Fantasia could be used to construct any world that the user desired. Of course, everything inside the world was bound to the paragon itself, which meant that it was impossible to leave the paragon with anything that was constructed inside the world. This made the paragon of fantasia an excellent place to train and hone magical skills, a mage could spend days, even weeks inside the world. The only dangerous side effect being that any undigested food and water would collapse into nothing with the rest of the world. Raiya had been gone for three days this time, and she looked it. Raiya’s clothes were tattered, her hair was disheveled, and she looked fairly dirty (which was impressive considering all Fantasia-constructed dirt disappeared upon world collapse, which meant all of the grime was organic in nature.)

Raiya closed the door to the Fantasia room and she dropped the bright blue paragon stone into the new and improved paragon suppression box. It was the same wooden box Felix had used before, but with a new runic formula that did not permanently sever the ley-lines of the paragons but temporarily suppressed them within a bounded field. The small chest was sitting at the edge of the worktable Travis and Felix were sitting at, and after Raiya dropped the paragon into one of the slots of the wooden chest, she closed it. “Damn, you eggheads are still going at it, huh? You two look worse than me, and I was almost swallowed by a taiga drake.” Raiya joked. “But seriously, how long have you two been up? I’ve seen Yakuza torture victims who looked better off than you do. And they had their skin flayed off.” Raiya had been becoming a little less hostile and a little more talkative as of late. Felix was not sure if he should take her friendlier disposition as a bad thing or a good thing, but ultimately he decided that it was better for the team if she got along with everyone. Felix let out a long sigh, “five… teen… fifty or so hours. I’m not even really sure. It’s a paradox, I know I need sleep to think about this straight, but I can’t sleep until we figure this out.” Felix reached out and grabbed the mug that was laying on the table in front of him. He took a sip of the now cold coffee, and then let out another long sigh. “Well, I’m going to go take a bath and maybe get drunk, so if you need me, I’ll be upstairs.” Raiya denoted before heading up the staircase.

“Well, Travis, anything of interest?” Felix asked again




Once Raiya closed the door to her room, she undressed and drew a bath, pouring half a bottle of green tea-mana infused soap into the water before sinking down into the hot water. A bath was the one exception to Raiya's hatred towards bodies of water. Raiya pulled a bottle of sake from her mana inventory and a tumbler glass. Raiya poured herself a drink, placing the rest of the bottle on a nearby bathroom table next to a book of daily affirmations that had been there before she occupied the room. As Raiya began to relax and sip her drink, she closed her eyes. But before Raiya could slip into unconsciousness the pinging of her manadial could be heard from the other room. Raiya sighed and stood out of the water, the splashing sound of disrupted bathwater accompanying her. She rushed over to the dial grabbing it, before rushing back to the water to avoid too much discomfort from the comparatively cold air verses the warmth of the bath water. She slinked back into the warm water, that now felt even hotter because of her body jumping from hot to cold to hot again. The manadial continued to ping until, frustrated, Raiya slapped the blue managem. Immediately, a mana-constructed hologram appeared of Tsukihi's face. The brunette whose traditionally half shaven hairstyle, now had a even pixie cut.

"Oh, ma'am, Ah did not know you were takin' a bath. Ah can call back iffin it's a bad time." Tsukihi said in her traditional southern accent. "No need, what is it, Tsukihi? Is it about what I asked for earlier?" Raiya asked. "N-no, ma'am. Although, ah did manage to fill your order. one-hundred and fifty of your special .45 ACP tungsten rounds." Tsukihi replied. "Good. Then I'll be there in the morning to pick them up." Raiya stated, and then motioned towards to end the call. "Wait! Ma'am." Tsukihi exclaimed, which stopped Raiya from ending the conference, "Ah said that's not why ah called." Raiya sighed before tipping back the rest of the sake in her glass into her mouth. "Then what could possibly be so important?" Raiya asked facetiously. "Well, ma'am. ah tried contacting you the past few days but I couldn't get through,"

Raiya sighed knowing that her radio silence was due to the interference from the paragon. She couldn't tell Tsukihi that she was in possession of one of the most powerful magical objects in existence for obvious reasons. So she just let Tsukihi continue, "Anyway, a few days ago we got some reports of some of our dealers down at the pier being killed off. We sent a team to investigate. But we are still waiting on our guy in the morgue and the police department to debrief us." Raiya let out a large exasperated and exaggerated sigh, "Jeez. I'm sure it's nothing. Alright? I'll be there in the morning to pick up my rounds. Don't make me wait around when I get there either." Raiya said before motioning to end the call, "But, ma'-" Before Tsukihi could finish her thought, Raiya ended the call. Raiya poured another tumbler of sake and began to relax once more.
Raiya widened her eyes as she heard the explanation from Felix. It all started to make sense to her now, why he couldn't side with her when she was excommunicated, why he had never even attempted to make contact with her after she left, and why Felix waited until a few weeks ago to leave the arcanocracy and attempt to recruit her and mend bridges. The holy grail, the threat of execution for even attempting to disclose of the ritual. Felix had been bound and gagged by the ritual he was forced to perform to become an arch-mage. A lot of emotions were welling up inside Raiya, brimming forth and spilling over until her mouth began to move on its own, ""Felix, I didn-..." Raiya caught herself before she laid bare too much of what she was feeling. She did not know if she was quite ready to forgive Felix. But one thing was for sure, her anger was stoked even more towards the arcanocracy for stealing everything from her.

Raiya rolled her eyes at the half-hearted apology from Nemo. Not even sparing a moment of thought to reply with anything but, "Tch- whatever..." Her thoughts were too disrupted by the new revelations regarding Felix that she was still processing everything. She continued to remain silent as an emotionally charged Zuri began to spill tears over the disclosure of Felix's predicament and her pledge to remain until the mission was complete. Raiya also remained silent during Travis's pledge, his voice displaying the honesty he could not display himself. It was apparent how hesitant Travis was to pledge his life to this mission, but Raiya figured there was something more that Travis was getting out of this adventure than just some warm fuzzies for helping humanity. Finally Raiya broke the silence with, "I don't know if I believe you about everything you just said. But I have known you since I was a child, and your aura has always been a constant calming white. One thing I noticed when he first came to me was that his aura, while still calming, had a feeling of instability to it. It felt as if Felix was charging a massive spell constantly. I just figured he had kept a few portals open as escape routes. But it does make sense. Regardless of what I want, I am honor-bound to remain here until the deed is finished or I have been released from my contract with Nemo. So, I am staying until we finish this, or we die. Which, honestly at this point, it is looking pretty certain that it might just be the latter" Raiya said in a calm tone. It was clear that Raiya still had a lot of processing to do on the matter, but she felt secure with her answer for the time being.




As Nemo spoke Felix sat forward, placing his elbows on his knees, clasping his hands together, and resting his chin on his clasped hands. "I might have used the term curse a little imperfectly there. I'm not quite sure if it actually is a true curse by definition. I've ran many biocrystal diagnostics on my mana-well. There was no apparent curse attached to me. A curse is like a parasite that feeds on your mana-well, while producing many horrid effects with your own mana that the curse has fed off of. The afforementioned horrid effects are by definition what people think of when they use the term, 'curse.' But there is no parasitic spells attached to me. By all accounts, I am as healthy as the day I became an arch-mage," Felix explained, leaning back in his chair and folding his hands on his stomach. "What is afflicting me seems to be less of a magical nature and more of a physical nature. Like a disease, an illness. That is wherein the problem lies. I honestly cannot figure out what has been afflicting me. Although, I do have some working theories. It is quite unnatural to permanently remove a portion of one's mana-well. In fact, most of the time it is quite fatal. My first hypothesis is that the reason why I am going through what I am calling: retrograde mana-well atrophy, is because I removed a portion of my mana-well. My second hypothesis is that, in order to cure myself, I must regain the portion of my mana-well I cut loose. Although, that does pose a problem, because the portion of my mana-well I severed would have been stored within the paragon of the grail that I bound myself to. While it might be possible to access it if we possessed it, the grail is deep in the heart of the vatican. It is most certainly the last paragon I would wish for you to retrieve. With that said, there may be a few working cures we could attempt in the mean time." Felix paused as if deep in thought, then shaking his head briefly, he continued, "I've tried been down many thaumaturgical paths, attempting to find a solution to my problem outside of reclaiming my mana-well from the holy grail, but my research has bore no fruits as of yet. However, I am not giving up, and-" Felix waved his right hand at Travis, "If you'll assist me in coming up with a solution to my dilemma, I am sure we will figure it out in no time."

Felix was taken aback by the crying Zuri, Felix did not really know how to react as he had just met the newest addition to the team a few weeks ago. Felix began to awkwardly smile and scratch the back of his own head with his right hand while slowly waving his left hand in a gesture of assuagement. "Don't cry, Zuri. I didn't mean to make you sad. I just felt you all deserved to know what you were in for." Felix tilted his head down and clasped his hands together in an apologetic manner, taking a somber tone, "I would like to say I am very sorry for not telling you all the truth about me. It was my hubris that led to the grizzly deaths of our members. I have to bear that responsibility alone. And if this is to continue, I need my conscience clear. So thank you guys, for looking past my faults and instead, believing in the mission itself." Felix finished
Raiya watched as Nemo began to use a crude marionette show to tell Felix the story of what happened during the mission. As Nemo unfolded what he saw were the accurate rendition of events, Raiya realized many disturbing inaccuracies. Now that she was dry and warming up, she was able to pull together the strength to lift herself up a bit and prop her back up on the arm of the sofa. Raiya was wearing a bigger scowl than she had when she was initially angry with Nemo for taking her kill. "It's quite interesting that your version of events neglected to mention that your bullet failed to kill the sniper, and I was the one to take her down," Raiya spat angrily. "And I just love how you glance over the fact that I utilized some of my biggest and best spellcraft to hold off Stockton, saving the lives of Travis and Zuri many times in the process, which allowed Zuri and Travis the chance to use that spell that sealed up Stockton's mana, Raiya growled. "But you didn't see any of that, did you? How could you when you're just off on your own doing whatever Nemo's do? It was ME who whittled down Stockton, ME who kept him preoccupied long enough to be tricked, AND ME WHO WAS BETRAYED BY THE ARCANOCRACY!" Raiya shouted the last part of her explanation in a flustered manner. "But could you let me take that kill? No!" Raiya grabbed the Nemo puppet and began moving it around in an arrogant manner, with its chest pushed forward and its head looking upward, "Oh hey! Look at me! I'm Nemo, the chief of the Morality Police! Raiya said in a silly sounding deeper voice from her normally feminine voice. She made the puppet cross its arms, "Little girl Raiya, did you know that killing is bad? Sorry but only me, Nemo, chief morality can kill people. Don't you know you're just a little girl and killing hurts people? Let me swoop in and take this MASSIVE BURDEN off your hands." Raiya inflected 'massive burden' so that it sounded extremely facetious and condescending. "I will protect you little Raiya, after all, you're just a little girl who can't handle herself and isn't capable of being responsible for her own actions." After her angry display, having gathered enough mana for a simple flame spell, Raiya snapped her fingers, the puppet burst into a controlled flame that only burned the puppet to nothing but black dust.




Felix watched all of this unfold, the initial puppet show and the angry reaction from Raiya. Felix folded his arm and furrowed his brow. "So, another member has fallen. Unfortunate to say the least. I wish I could say something to console you all and reassure you that things will get better. Alas, I am at a lack of words. I know I did not tell you all before you were recruited, the true dangers of this mission. With that said, I would like to extend to you the option of leaving now and never looking back." Felix's rather calming appearance was now altered with an abnormally stern and serious expression. "Before you make your decision, I want to make a move in complete honesty. I have not told you everything."

Felix began pacing, clasping his hands behind his back, and walking back and forth with his gaze facing down. "The catholic arcanocracy is very clandestine. There are many things that even high ranking members within the magi organization do not know. One of those such things is such a closely guarded secret, that disclosing it is not just grounds for excommunication but execution. What I am about to tell you is something even Raiya, a grand-magi before her own excommunication could not have known," Felix continued to explain. "Ranking up in the arcanocracy is normally a simple procedure, a council of magi appoint nominees for receiving a promotion, and then the council convenes to vote on if they do or do not receive said promotion. Once the voting is over and the majority votes in favor of promotion, the individual who has been nominated receives their new mantle both figuratively and literally." Felix paused in both his speech and his pacing and turned to face the group, "What I have just told you is true for all of the ranks except two," Felix held out his index and middle finger to signify, 'two.' "The arch-magi, and the papal-magi. The explanation of the papal magi isn't pertinent to what I am about to tell you, though. In order to become an arch-magi, the nomination process occurs, but then the nominee who has recieved the majority 'ye' votes is referred to the papal-magi, who then decides himself if the candidate is suited to being an arch-magi. After the papal-magi confirms the candidate, the then candidate does not simply place on a new cloak." Felix shook his head, "No, the candidate then has to undergo a process called a blood oath, or better known as an aura contract. The candidate has to place a drop of his blood into an enchanted artifact known as the Holy Grail. Placing your blood into this object is akin to writing your name on a contract that binds your soul to the artifact for eternity. It forges an aura-contract creating a permanent ley-line between it and the contractee, which allows whomever controls the device to activate a high-thaumaturgical spell that can instantly end the life of the contractee." Felix folded his arms once more, "It essentially forces a life of servitude to the church, to anyone stupid enough to place their blood into it. I, like every other arch-mage before me, had to undergo this ritual. For this reason, I was not able to stand by Raiya when she was excommunicated, and for this reason I was not able to immediately oppose the arcanocracy when they began to head down the path of claiming the paragons for themselves."

Felix sat down in an empty leather recliner, and reclined the chair to prop his feet up. "Obviously, I figured out a way to subvert this artifice. Or I would not be here talking with you now. I uncovered an ancient spell that was designed to sever ley-lines specifically. Unfortunately that was not enough. The ley-line that connected me to the Grail was so deeply embedded in my aura that simply severing it would take the power of a paragon to achieve. In fact, the grail IS a paragon in and of itself. Its power holds true to the other paragons for certain. In order for me to sever the ley-line, I had to go deeper. Modifying the spell that severed ley-lines, I created a spell that could actually remove a portion of my mana-well. This spell's new variant that I created was untested. And, in order for me to achieve this spell, I had to be touching the grail to ascertain the portion of my mana-well the ley-line was attached to. I stole in, in the dead of night, and placed my hand on the grail, reciting the modified spell. It was a success, in as far as it did sever my connection with the grail, but at a great cost. Not only did I lose a large portion of my mana-well, but I also inadvertently started a chain reaction, a curse within my mana-well that has been gnawing at me ever since. This curse will continuously eat away at my natural mana reserves until I am dead. I set up this manor along of the largest natural earthly ley-lines, and constructed a massive runic circle that has been keeping the curse in stasis, and regenerating a small fraction of my lost mana. As long as I am within the bounds of the constructed spacial field, I will not die. For this reason, I have not accompanied you all on your missions, for this reason, I have not been able to lend my aid, for this reason I was not able to protect the ones who believed in this mission. It is because of my foolishness that I have to ask others to accomplish this impossibly dangerous task to prevent the destruction of the world at large." Felix finished his exposition leaning back in his chair, the seriousness of his expression still fresh upon his face.
Raiya was plopped down on the leather couch, which Raiya was pretty certain was definitely not good for the leather. She was still soaked to the bone, and having no mana to use an instant evaporation spell, nor the stamina to move from her spot, meant that she just had to lay uncomfortably in her drenched state. When Nemo, obviously irritated, suggested she could take care of herself, she realized that Nemo probably knew she was not in such a state, but did not care if she experienced some discomfort. Being as angry as she still was with Nemo, she honestly preferred him being cold and distant. Just as well, Raiya felt as if she deserved to baste in seawater and regret.

Felix walked up to the couch that Raiya was slumped on, drips of seawater plopped onto the hardwood floor from the couch, causing Felix to pause. The portal he had opened before closed behind him with Zuri coming in last. Felix tilted his head and gave Raiya a puzzled look. "Go away, Felix. I am not in the mood to be lectured right now," Raiya moaned. "It certainly would be an oddity if you were in the mood to be lectured... But, seeing as how you are completely out of mana, I can see why you did not really have a choice other than to desecrate a good leather couch, so I won't be lecturing you," Felix explained. Then he snapped his fingers, casting a evaporation spell that covered the immediate room, causing all materials to dry instantly, and making it very humid within the living space. He then opened a window and flicked his wrist causing a large breeze to blow through, evacuating the humid air outside nad replacing it with normal dry air. "Much better," Felix said with a smile.

Felix took stock of the room, "Well, it looks like our team is a little smaller now," Felix said, referencing Zoe's absence. Felix surveyed the room a little closer and realized Travis was holding a blue stone. "Well, I didn't feel irregular mana waves, so I just assumed you failed in retrieving the paragon. But if I am to assume that this stone right here is the paragon, then... That means you used the spell to cut the ley-lines again?" Felix surmised, "I suppose it makes sense that you would have to get rid of manawave interference to contact me since you were in the middle of the ocean and all," Felix let out a long sigh, "Oh well, what is done is done. I suppose that just means we will have to double our efforts on figuring a way to reestablish ley-line connections. Anyway, I am anxious to hear how this all happened. Does anybody want to give a quick recap?" Felix finished.
Mana resuscitation and Rehabilitation, the dusty old tome Felix was pouring over was nearly a century old. Felix had hoped the contents of the book would help shed light on his recent problem. But, as Felix continued to skim through the pages more rapidly, it was becoming increasingly clear that the book did not contain any knowledge that Felix was not already privy to. Felix let out a sigh and dropped his legs down from their resting place up on his desk, closing the book and placing it on top of another recently skimmed tome Blood Oaths and Aura Contracts: A Guide to Contractual Thaumaturgy.

Felix placed his elbows on his desk and removed his reading glasses with his left hand, using his right hand to massage the corners of his eyes with his thumb and index finger. 'If only I had more time, I'm sure I could think of another way...' Felix thought as he continued to massage his tear ducts. 'Perhaps severing the ley-lines is the only way' Felix considered briefly before he was interrupted by the flashing of his manadial. Felix opened his eyes and twisted his wrist to check the alert the manadial was responding to. His eyes widened as he realized exactly what it was: a distress beacon, coming from the middle of the pacific ocean.

Felix hopped to his feet and conjured his robes onto his body, before executing a cross-glyph portal spell, and slipping through it. Felix had opened the portal to just a few feet away and slightly above where the distress signal went up. Falling down towards the ocean, a bit too gracefully, Felix conjured up manaegis greaves, dropping onto the water with a reverberate clunk. His manaegis repelled physical matter, which meant that he wasn't necessarily walking on water, but rather gliding on it. Looking around after making his landing, Felix spotted a magically constructed boat a few yards off and began to glide towards it, moving his feat as if he were ice skating. As he picked up speed and distance, he eventually abruptly angled his body to stop just before reaching the makeshift watercraft.

"Well, I was expecting to walk into a battle, but it appears your distress signal was of a natural nature rather than an adversarial one." Felix let out a sigh of relief, "Well, regardless lets get you home." Felix lifted his right hand etching out a rune in the air, opening his trademark cross-glyph portal at the front of the boat.
Raiya flopped out onto the deck of the newly conjured spell-boat. Raiya let out a huge sigh, "Well, it looks like someone did have a life raft in their back pocket. I stand corrected... Er, rather, lay uselessly corrected." Raiya's voice was monotone and weak, which made her attempt at levity sound more like a bit of nihilistic sarcasm. After a moment Nemo suggested Travis utilize the same spell that was used on the enemy earlier on the paragon. After a huge display of mana feedback from what ever that runic spell Travis had been using was, Raiya realized that there were no latent mana waves exuding from the condensed stone of mana. Raiya raised an eyebrow in an uncontrolled instinctual expression. She couldn't stop her outward appearance from displaying her impressed state. The expression only lasted a brief moment, and in her current state of being uselessly slumped on the deck of the magical raft, it would have been fairly hard to catch her facial expression.

Afterward, Travis suggested to the others that someone should attempt to contact Felix to which Raiya responded with, "I would, but I sort of can't feel or move my limbs."
After the singularity pulled her in, Raiya's fatigue overwhelmed her, causing her to fall into a state of deep unconsciousness. Because of her unconscious state, she did not inhale any water when she crashed through the surface of the ocean. She came to completely groggy, her head pounding from a mixture of exhaustion and lack of oxygen. It was only after a few minutes that she recognized Nemo's arm was what was keeping her aloft. In her angry state she would have much rather drown than had Nemo touching any part of her, but without the necessary energy to resist, she just remained quite and floated uselessly like driftwood.

"Great, so we've prolonged the inevitable," Raiya groaned, "but what's the point? We're still going to die in the middle of this god-forsaken ocean. I mean, unless someone has any idea other than swimming hundreds of miles." Raiya bemoaned. "I mean, Felix can't locate us and we can't use our manadials thanks to the paragon. So, unless someone is hiding a life raft in their pocket, we are pretty much so doomed." Raiya finished.
Raiya wanted to resist, but ultimately, she decided it was an effort in futility. If indeed the entire island was a construct of the paragon, that meant that even if she were to successfully run away from the singularity, it would eventually grow to consume everything within the constructed parameter. This also meant that the only way out was in. This concept was very unfortunate for Raiya, she knew what awaited them was a unforgiving body of salt water at the other end of that singularity. Unable to swim Raiya, and the salt water also sapping her mana and energy, she would be completely limp and useless. Unless one of her teammates did something, the end result would be her demise at the hands of a cruel sea.

Still feeling drained from her encounter with Father Stockton, she didn't have the energy to fight the singularity even if she wanted to. After about 30 seconds, Raiya relented and folded her arms in surrender, letting her body go slack and allowing the singularity to draw her in. The suction force eventually swept her up through the air, she tumbled for about five seconds before being consumed by the singularity.
Raiya watched as the event unfolded. Travis was obviously shaken by the dud gunshot, and justifiably so. But a moment after he came to his senses, Travis had retrieved the paragon from the grasp of the weak skeleton husk. The skeleton let out an objection that sounded more like scolding. It was then Raiya realized that they knew next to nothing about where they were or what they were up against. Instantly, the skeleton folded into a singularity that threatened to pull the whole group in with it. After Nemo's explanation, it all clicked. The cleanliness of the temple rooms, the gold that smelled right but with no dust or signs that it had been sitting there for hundreds of years. It was all because they were inside a projection, some sort of advanced stasis field projected by the paragon itself. And without the original user interfacing with the paragon, the advanced construct began to fold in on itself.

"Guys... if the paragon constructed all of this inside a dimensional pocket, then what is going to happen when this all collapses without the original user? What's going to happen to us?" Raiya asked as the gale force winds whipped around her, pulling her closer to the center of the room. "Is this whole island a construct of the paragon? Are we going to get tossed back into the ocean?" Raiya asked frantically. Not knowing how to swim herself, Raiya did not like the thought of being plopped in the middle of a raging sea again. And, without someone like Felix to open a portal for them, she wasn't sure how long even an experienced swimmer could last in the middle of even a calm sea. Raiya's mana was still mostly drained, and fatigue had already set in from her battle. Dying in the middle of an ocean did not sound pleasant, but Raiya wasn't even sure if there was any option at this point.
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