The Years of Apocalypse - A Time Loop Progression Fantasy

When the dust had settled, Magistrate Ada approached Mirian. She still looked properly regal in her red coat of office, but the sleepless nights were apparent in her eyes. “The prisoner says he’ll talk to you,” Ada said. She paused, then added, “How did you know?”

Mirian looked past her, to the interrogation room where Idras was sitting, body still hunched. “I’ve seen other possible futures. They don’t end well.”

Already, her knowledge seemed to be otherwise inexplicable enough that Ada merely looked at her, and had no response.

“I’ll see him.” She was nervous with anticipation. How much would Idras tell her? And how much of it would be true? Was he truly shaken by the betrayal of his fellow spy, or was it just an act?

“We’ll be just outside, if you need assistance. Torrviol will appreciate what you learn.”

“My second home,” Mirian said, smiling. She wondered what Ada felt. How much would she trust a stranger with knowledge of the future, if she were in her shoes? Mirian walked into the interrogation room. It was strange. It wasn’t so long ago that she’d been sitting on the other side with Captain Mandez’s cruel eyes staring her down. This time, she was sitting on the other side of the table.

“Hi,” Mirian said, because she didn’t actually know how to interrogate someone.

Idras didn’t look at her, nor at any of the decorations around the room. He just looked at an unremarkable spot on the table. Finally, he started to speak. “You were right about one thing. I am a patriot. God as my witness, I have only ever served and loved Akana Praediar.” Mirian heard the crack in his voice as he swapped to Eskanar and said, “And now here I am, in my colleague’s room.”

Mirian had to think about the Eskanar word for ‘colleague’ to make sure she hadn’t missed a second meaning of it. “So Captain Mandez wasn’t just taking bribes.”

Idras swapped back to Friian as he said, “No. I may as well tell you his real name is Nathanial Hache. I don’t know how he ever managed to pass himself off as south Baracueli.” Idras winced. “He would have given the order for my assassination. I was at his son’s wedding.”

Mirian’s mouth went dry. That was a kind of ruthlessness she couldn’t even comprehend. She let Idras continue.

“It is not how the Republic Intelligence Division is supposed to act. Something has gone wrong. You say this all ends Akana Praediar. How?”

“It has to do with the Divine Monument,” Mirian said.

“Is that what you call it? I’m not privy to the classified information, but I know the name. We call it the Ancient Weapon.”

Mirian thought about what she’d learned from Nicolus about politics. “Powerful enough that Akana doesn’t even trust an ally with one?”

“Of course we don’t trust you with it. You’re already using it on us.”

“What? That can’t be right. No one on the project can figure out how it works. You must know that—with all the break-ins, you must have seen all the reports.”

Idras was still staring at that spot on the table. He ground his jaw a bit, lost in thought then said, “The reports didn’t add up with the information we got from the break-ins. They were… mixed. I assumed that one group of researchers was being deceived by an inner circle that had made a breakthrough.”

Mirian thought. “You know about the underground passages, but did you ever actually get into the room with the monument? Or Torrian Tower?”

“No, of course not. That would have been…” He trailed off. “Her code name is Specter, so that’s what we call her.”

“Adria Gavell. Or at least, her impostor.”

Idras nodded. “Then I was a fool. Never trust a double agent; they’ve already shown they have no reservations about betrayal.”

Double agent. So the Impostor is Baracueli? “You don’t know who the Impostor is?”

“Someone with pull. She outranked Adria, before her death, and Hache was ordered to take directions from her. The reports she gave us… does Archmage Luspire truly not know what the device down there does?”

“No one does. Or at least, they sure didn’t seem to. If Song Jei and High Wizard Ferrandus don’t know, then who would?”

Idras sighed. “I suppose the signs were there. They were desperate enough to put a Zhighuan on the project. Wouldn’t have been needed if it was working. Specter’s played us all for fools, then.”

Mirian bristled at the barb against her mentor. She’d been feeling all that sympathy for the man, and then his casual prejudice came out like bile. Remember that, she chided herself. She suppressed her anger. In the end, those comments didn’t matter. All of it would be erased. She continued. “Has Akana Praediar uncovered their own ‘Ancient Weapon’?”

“Something like that. It was Divine in origin, we know that much. The details are above my station.”

“Who would know?”

“The research was done somewhere near Arborholm, but the researchers must have come from Vadriach University. I can’t even begin to tell you all the layers of secrecy around… all of this. I’m not just talking about the Ancient Weapon. My cell is part of it too. It all fits under the banner of an operation secret enough I don’t even know the name of it. I’m actually not even supposed to know the operation exists, but my superiors aren’t as clever as they think they are. But if we’re starting to kill our own, then something has gone very, very wrong.” He shook his head. “Why? Has fidelity lost its meaning?”

Mirian knew enough of Akana Praediar’s geography to know Arborholm was one of the larger towns, at about the same latitude as Torrviol. Vadriach, of course, was the capital of Akana Praediar. Its university was doing cutting-edge research on magic, and was responsible for the fancy spell engines all the classrooms used to project illusionary diagrams. “So this is all part of… some other project?”

“I wish I could tell you more,” Idras said. He shook his head again. “Timmons was the only face in the second cell I knew. We coordinated. I don’t know the others. I can also tell you we’re not following the standard operating procedure, so I don’t know how many you’ll have to hunt down.” He paused, eyes still fixed on that point on the table, like if he stared long enough, it would tell him something important. Then he finally looked up at Mirian. “How does it happen? How does Akana Praediar fall?”

“You do something with the Divine Monument. Blow it up, try to activate it, I don’t know, the Akanan army obviously doesn’t let me watch—and then the leylines start bursting out of the ground. Everyone dies.” There was no need to tell him about the moon falling. She needed Idras to believe his actions would stop what was coming.

Idras leaned back in his chair, examining Mirian. He had an intensity to his gaze. “But the device—it can reach through time. Maybe it’s sent more than you back. If it has… well, God save me, I have no idea how the leylines work, but… if it can reach through time…?”

Mirian thought she understood where he was going with this. What if it had sent more than Mirian back? What if it had also sent some big energy pulse? “When is Akana Praediar… attacked?”

“Oh, it’s been happening for several years, at this point. It was when a factory in Ferrabridge exploded five years ago that the operation began. Two thousand dead, like that,” he said, snapping his fingers. “I volunteered for whatever they needed, no matter how dangerous. As I said, I’m a patriot. I would do anything for my country.”

“That wouldn’t make sense. I return to the 1st of Solen. Never any earlier.”

“Then I don’t know. But you know what happens next. How do I help you save Akana Praediar?”

After that, the conversation became about the details of how the spies relayed messages and what they would need to tell the army. Idras looked baffled when she brought up the future incident in Palendurio. He seemed to think that Akana Praediar would simply proclaim that Baracuel had been using a secret weapon to the world, and that would be casus belli enough. After all, he’d been assured by his superiors that the connection between Torrviol’s secret project and the magical explosions in Akana Praediar had been proven by researchers in Vadriach.

The spies, it turned out, had found an old ruined spire about a mile north, well hidden among the towering trees. There, they’d set up a zephyr falcon roost, secured by its own tiny spellward around the base. They’d been pilfering the fossilized myrvite they needed to run it from the outpost towers around Torrviol.

Whenever they wanted to send a message, they stole some pigs from the nearby farms and slaughtered them along the route. This, of course, lured out larger myrvite predators, who weren’t going to resist a fresh, easy meal. Busy with easy food, they ignored the spies as they made the journey back and forth, but then the myrvites stuck around the area looking for more food. It kept the ruined spire protected, but not in any way that seemed suspicious.

The farmers in turn assumed the myrvites had just gotten by the spellward somehow, which also explained why so many people were angry with Mayor Wolden. The bog lion corpse was just the final straw.

And if there’s myrvites all over the north forest, why wouldn’t a few try to make dens inside the catacombs?

In the end, Idras agreed to testify both against Captain Mandez—or Nathanial, since that was apparently his real name—and Mayor Wolden, who Timmons had leverage over. He also agreed he would write and sign a message to his superiors asking them to call off the attack. He would mention that the Academy was going to allow an Akanan team from Vadriach examine the Divine Monument, and that Specter had been filing false reports. This meant Mirian would need to get Archmage Luspire to agree to all that, of course. Mirian relayed all of this to Magistrate Ada.

Getting Archmage Luspire on board sounded simple enough, especially with the support of several professors and the town’s magistrate. However, if there was one thing Mirian had learned so far, it was that it would be nothing of the sort.

***

When Mirian and Jei were at last alone in the grove north of the gardens, it was a relief. Already, she was having nostalgia for the simplicity of being a student. The time loop had taken away the stress of classes, and she’d just been able to learn, and enjoy learning. It was the thing she was good at. This other stuff that involved talking to people, politicking, and stirring up the entire town for a war—it was absurd. Once again, she wondered: why me?

“What do you think of the Gods?” Mirian asked Respected Jei. She remembered her discomfort at a comment she’d made about blessings or something.

“In ordinary circumstances, I would never answer that,” Jei said. “But I will tell you. I do not believe in their divinity.”

That struck Mirian as strange. “But you believe in their… existence.”

“One would be a fool not to. The evidence of their existence is well attested in the historical record, and in circumstantial evidence. How else do we explain things like the Monument? But why does their prowess make them divine?”

“The words of the Prophets. The first ones. They said as much. And the Gods created Enteria. The Labyrinth is proof enough of that.”

Jei pulled out her orb and let the dappled sunlight play off it so that plants nearby glittered with the refractions. “Through the rise and fall of empires, we have already lost many great techniques. No one can create the ancestral orbs anymore, even as our knowledge in magic advances in other ways. Imagine an unlearned human encountering one a thousand years ago; it would seem an impossible feat. Perhaps so advanced they would consider it an Elder artifact.”

“I think I get your point. But the Elder Gods—I mean, there’s a qualitative difference, isn’t there? They can manipulate parts of the world we can’t even see. And time itself, if I’m any indication.”

Jei shrugged. “I do not seek to change your mind on this. Only to answer your question. I will add one more thought: the words of the prophets have been changed. Through the centuries, the documents that exist in Zhighua are and the ones in Baracuel have diverged greatly. I cannot say if this is through deliberate interference, or simply chains of translation shifting meanings piece by piece, but there can be no doubt the difference exists. With the originals missing, whose word is true? There would be no schisms in the religious orders if that absolute truth were knowable. Religion becomes another tool, like crowns and laws and rifles, to be wielded by those who seek control.”

Mirian considered that as she looked about. With winter’s approach, the surrounding forest was a mix of skeletal branches and evergreen needles. Here and there, myrvite winterbloom flowers defied the seasons, pale petals resembling snowflakes. “So what philosophy do you follow?”

“One similar to yours, I imagine. We gain our ethical codes from family. From the society around us. And just because I do not believe the Elders were divine does not mean I cannot appreciate their teachings. Does this satisfy you?”

“I just keep wondering why I was chosen. Of all the people—why would I get sent back in time?”

“Perhaps you weren’t. Perhaps it was chance. Many things are.”

“A cosmic accident? Maybe. Maybe that would make more sense. I just… I guess it’s all speculation at this point. I still don’t know how to figure out how it all works, never mind the why of it.” She shook her head to clear it. “Well, what’s the curriculum? After I master your foundational techniques.”

Jei picked up a dead leaf from the ground and examined it. “I wish I knew how much time you had. I must believe the time you have is finite. But I must also look at the task that has been set before you. I consider it must be impossible without an understanding of magic that exceeds anyone in the Academy. Therefore, I must prepare you to make discoveries. After you have mastered the foundations, we must expand your knowledge of the glyphs, until it becomes like another language to you.”

“I bet Seneca can help with that.”

“So I imagine. You must learn what you can from everyone who is worth learning from.”

They were silent for a time. The wind rustled through the trees. A few birds tweeted out tentative songs. Mirian took a deep breath. “Well. Might as well get back to it. What exercise should I start with?”

“Twelve through twenty,” Jei said. “You must work on introducing no oscillation when you displace energy. Doubly so when working with two energy types. I will demonstrate, and you will copy. Pay attention to the initial formation…”

And for a time, Mirian could forget all the things she needed to do, all the pieces on the board of life she needed to move about, and just—learn. She practiced until her aura was as bare as the deciduous trees, then quaffed a mana elixir and practiced more.