Smoke curled lazily toward the ceiling.

  Ishrael Voss lay flat on his back among a scattered rain of copper fittings and shattered crystal fragments, blinking slowly at the rotating constellation of lights overhead. Something in the lab continued humming with irritated persistence, as though the machines themselves disapproved of the interruption.

  His ears rang.

  That was… not ideal.

  He lifted his head cautiously. The worktable he had approached moments earlier now bore a blackened scorch mark across its surface where the crystal had detonated. Several tools still rattled gently as they settled into place. One of the suspended armatures above the table continued spinning, adjusting itself with mechanical irritation.

  Ishrael groaned and pushed himself upright.

  “Good news,” he muttered hoarsely to himself. “Still alive.”

  A metallic clang sounded from somewhere deeper in the labyrinth of machinery.

  Then another.

  Then a sliding hiss as something heavy shifted position.

  Ishrael froze.

  The sound of movement approached rapidly through the maze of workstations and suspended equipment. Pipes rattled overhead. A coil of tubing jerked aside as if shoved by something large moving through the narrow space behind the main apparatus banks.

  And then she arrived.

  Washia Vitrina did not enter the room so much as descend into it.

  A length of polished copper conduit dropped from the ceiling above the central reactor frame, and a serpentine form slid down it in one fluid motion. Scales flashed silver-blue under the glow of the lab’s many crystals as her long naga body coiled effortlessly across the pipe and then dropped the final distance to the floor.

  She landed with the casual grace of someone who had done that exact maneuver hundreds of times.

  Thin goggles perched crookedly on the bridge of her nose.

  A scattering of etched rune scars marked the scales along her collarbone and upper arms. Her head was completely smooth save for small spines running along the top of her hood, revealing the subtle branching pattern of lightning-veins beneath her scales, faint threads of pale Fulgaria energy that pulsed when she grew excited.

  At the moment, they pulsed quite a lot.

  She swept into view around the corner of the worktable and planted both hands on the scorched surface.

  Bright yellow eyes fixed instantly on Ishrael.

  “Ishrael,” she said slowly.

  Her voice carried the quiet intensity of someone holding back a far larger explosion than the one that had just occurred.

  “Yes?” Ishrael answered cautiously.

  Washia inhaled.

  Then pointed at the glowing crystal fragments scattered across the workbench.

  “I believe,” she said with great precision, “that I have mentioned—on more than one occasion—that you are not to touch anything that is glowing.”

  Ishrael gestured weakly toward the debris.

  “In my defense…”

  Washia leaned forward.

  “…it was glowing.”

  Her eyes narrowed.

  “Yes,” she said. “That tends to happen when things are about to explode.”

  She straightened abruptly and snatched a copper instrument from the table. The device looked like a cross between a tuning fork and a surgical probe. Without another word she began scanning the damaged apparatus, tapping crystals, tightening clamps, muttering calculations under her breath.

  A loose coil sparked violently when she brushed it.

  Washia slapped it with the wrench in her other hand.

  The machine settled instantly.

  “There,” she said with satisfaction. “Perfectly stable.”

  Ishrael stared at the still-smoking apparatus.

  “That was stable?”

  “Of course.”

  She adjusted her goggles and peered into the crystal lattice.

  “If it had been unstable, the reactor core would have collapsed and the containment field would have inverted.”

  She paused thoughtfully.

  “…which would have vaporized half the sewer district.”

  Ishrael blinked.

  Washia turned toward him.

  “See?” she said brightly. “Stable.”

  She moved away from the table and began rummaging through a pile of tools stacked on a nearby platform. Metal clinked and crystals rattled as she searched for something only she seemed to understand.

  While she worked, Ishrael took the opportunity to properly observe the room.

  Washia’s laboratory resembled the inside of a mind that had forgotten the concept of restraint.

  Mana conduits crawled across the walls in intricate spirals, feeding into clusters of small reactor cores mounted along the ceiling. Each one contained a rotating crystal suspended inside a ring of etched metal bands. The reactors pulsed in careful rhythm, cycling stored energy through the chamber’s many machines.

  Tables were stacked on top of other tables.

  Glass vessels bubbled quietly.

  Several devices hovered in the air, rotating slowly as automated runes recalibrated their structures.

  One machine in the corner appeared to be assembling something on its own using a pair of articulated metal arms.

  Ishrael watched the arms attach a crystal to a ring of copper wiring.

  The device hummed.

  Washia glanced at it.

  “…I didn’t build that.”

  The machine hummed louder.

  She stared at it for a moment.

  Then shrugged.

  “Interesting.”

  She grabbed a charcoal stick and scribbled a note on the nearest wall.

  “Investigate spontaneous assembly behavior later.”

  Ishrael rubbed his temples.

  “Master Washia…”

  She waved the wrench in his direction without looking up.

  “If you’re about to apologize again, don’t bother. It’s inefficient.”

  “I wasn’t going to apologize.”

  Washia finally turned.

  “Oh?”

  “I came to report something.”

  That got her attention.

  Washia slowly lowered the wrench.

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  Her lightning-veins dimmed slightly as her expression shifted from irritation to curiosity.

  “Something worth interrupting my research?” she asked.

  Ishrael hesitated.

  Outside the hidden labyrinth of the lab, Futaria’s city above them churned with quiet preparation.

  Warriors gathering.

  Powerful forces moving.

  Rumors spreading through alleyways and barracks alike.

  “Yes,” he said finally.

  Washia watched him for a moment.

  Then her eyes sharpened.

  “Well?”

  Ishrael drew a slow breath.

  “The Iron Tenth is moving.”

  Washia didn’t respond immediately.

  She simply stared at Ishrael.

  Then she reached over and twisted a valve on the nearest reactor column. The crystal inside spun faster for a moment before settling into a quieter rhythm. Only after the machine stabilized did she speak again.

  “The Iron Tenth,” she repeated thoughtfully.

  Her coils shifted slightly as she leaned back against the workbench, arms folding across her chest.

  “That’s unusual.”

  Ishrael nodded.

  “They’re not marching.”

  That made her eyebrows lift.

  “Not marching?”

  “They're preparing.”

  Washia’s lightning-veins pulsed faintly along the smooth scales of her temples.

  “Quietly,” Ishrael added.

  That got her full attention.

  Washia straightened.

  “Oh?”

  He gestured vaguely upward, meaning the city above them.

  “They’re enchanting weapons. Reinforcing armor. Checking gear.”

  “Thats simple rock-brain routine.”

  “No,” Ishrael said carefully. “Not routine.”

  Washia’s eyes narrowed slightly.

  The difference between routine readiness and quiet preparation was not a subtle one.

  Routine readiness meant drills.

  Quiet preparation meant someone powerful had given an order that no one wanted overheard.

  Washia’s gaze drifted across the machines of her laboratory as she considered that.

  Then she reached for a crystal on the table, slotting it into a copper bracket while thinking aloud.

  “Let’s see… the Iron Tenth does not mobilize quietly unless they believe the threat could be internal.”

  The bracket sparked once.

  Washia smacked it with the wrench.

  The spark stopped.

  “Which means someone expects trouble inside the city.”

  Ishrael nodded slowly.

  “There’s more.”

  Washia’s eyes flicked toward him.

  “Oh good,” she said dryly. “I was worried this was merely concerning.”

  He hesitated for a moment.

  “Several powerful individuals are gathering in Futaria.”

  That earned a brief glance.

  “Also concerning.”

  “And—”

  He paused.

  Washia waited.

  Ishrael finally finished the sentence.

  “—the Rafarius is in the city.”

  Washia stopped moving.

  Completely.

  The reactor cores overhead hummed quietly.

  A glass vessel bubbled in the corner.

  But Washia herself froze as if someone had suddenly replaced her with a statue.

  Then she sighed.

  “Oh for the love of rational thought.”

  She pushed away from the workbench and began pacing across the lab, coils sliding smoothly along the floor.

  “Of course he is.”

  Ishrael watched her warily.

  “You don’t sound surprised.”

  “I’m not surprised.”

  She waved a hand dismissively.

  “Whenever enough power gathers in one place, Malachius inevitably arrives to admire himself.”

  Washia moved to another workstation and began adjusting a series of etched rings around a glowing crystal.

  “Walking lightning storm that he is.”

  Ishrael tilted his head slightly.

  “You don’t approve.”

  Washia snorted.

  “Approve?”

  She turned and jabbed a finger in the air.

  “Malachius possesses one of the most refined Fulgaria-aligned minds alive.”

  She pointed to herself.

  “Second most refined, obviously.”

  Then she pointed toward the sewer ceiling.

  “And what does he do with that extraordinary intellect?”

  Ishrael remained silent.

  Washia answered her own question.

  “He uses it to vaporize armies.”

  She resumed pacing.

  “Power generation. Mana resonance theory. Dimensional harmonics. The man could have rewritten half the scientific foundations of Nytheris.”

  Her coils twisted irritably.

  “Instead he plays warlord.”

  She stopped suddenly and leaned across the table toward Ishrael.

  “A criminal waste of intellectual potential.”

  Ishrael raised an eyebrow.

  “You sound personally offended.”

  Washia straightened her goggles.

  “I am personally offended.”

  She gestured around the lab.

  “I’m forced to live in a sewer because of the current regime.”

  Her voice took on a biting sarcasm.

  “‘All resources distributed according to need.’”

  She pointed toward the ceiling again.

  “Apparently soldiers and bureaucrats need everything.”

  Then she swept her arm toward the dripping stone walls.

  “And the scientist who could advance their entire civilization?”

  She spread her arms wide.

  “Gets a drainage canal.”

  The lab hummed quietly behind her.

  Washia sighed dramatically.

  “Before Oryx died, do you know what research looked like?”

  Ishrael didn’t answer.

  He had learned long ago that Washia preferred rhetorical questions, especially in regards to old friends.

  “Unlimited resources,” she continued.

  “Dragons, mana wells, experimental ranges the size of cities.”

  She tapped the table with her wrench.

  “Now?”

  She gestured around again.

  “Sewers.”

  A machine on the far wall suddenly whirred to life.

  Washia glanced at it.

  “…I didn’t build that.”

  The device rotated once and began emitting a faint oscillating hum.

  Washia stared at it thoughtfully.

  “Huh.”

  She grabbed a stylus and scribbled another note onto the wall.

  “Investigate spontaneous machine assembly later.”

  Ishrael rubbed his forehead.

  Washia finally turned back to him.

  “So.”

  Her eyes sharpened again.

  “Malachius is in the city. The Iron Tenth is quietly preparing for conflict.”

  She tapped the wrench against her palm.

  “That implies a convergence of significant forces.”

  Her voice lowered slightly.

  “And you came all the way down here simply to tell me this?”

  Ishrael hesitated.

  “…not exactly.”

  Washia tilted her head.

  “Oh?”

  He glanced toward the reactors overhead before continuing.

  “There’s also a rumor.”

  Washia sighed.

  “I despise rumors.”

  Ishrael pressed on anyway.

  “It’s spreading through the city from Boltea.”

  Washia froze again.

  Her lightning-veins flickered faintly.

  “…Boltea,” she repeated slowly.

  “Yes.”

  Ishrael hesitated one last time.

  Then he said it.

  “They’re saying the gate there collapsed.”

  Washia blinked.

  Once.

  Then twice.

  And then she laughed.

  A single short laugh.

  Not amused.

  Disbelieving.

  “Collapsed?” she said.

  Her voice had gone very quiet.

  “That’s impossible.”

  Her voice carried none of the earlier sarcasm now. It was quieter. Sharper. The way a blade sounded when it slid from its sheath.

  “That’s impossible.”

  Ishrael shifted his weight slightly.

  “That’s what people are saying.”

  Washia stared at him as if he had just informed her that gravity had stopped working.

  “No,” she said flatly. “They are wrong.”

  She turned abruptly and swept across the lab toward a suspended crystal array mounted above one of the reactors. Her coils moved faster now, purpose replacing irritation.

  “Do you know how a gate stabilizes itself, Ishrael?”

  He opened his mouth.

  Closed it.

  “…no.”

  Washia snorted softly.

  “Of course you don’t.”

  She grabbed a thin metal pointer from a nearby rack and tapped the crystal array above them.

  “Pure mana is unstable.”

  The crystals flickered faintly as her pointer brushed their surfaces.

  “Left to itself, raw mana collapses under its own dimensional tension. It tears itself apart.”

  She gestured toward a small rotating sphere of light in the center of the array.

  “But when impurities exist inside the mana structure—”

  She tapped the sphere again.

  “—those impurities form a lattice.”

  The crystal sphere responded by projecting a faint geometric framework into the air around it. A shimmering web of intersecting lines.

  “A stabilizing framework,” Washia continued. “A crystal lattice of controlled imperfections.”

  She glanced back at Ishrael.

  “That lattice distributes the pressure between dimensions.”

  Her pointer traced along the web of lines.

  “You can damage a gate. You can overload it. You can destabilize it if you are exceptionally foolish.”

  She flicked the pointer downward.

  “But you cannot collapse it.”

  The crystal lattice flickered and vanished.

  Washia turned back toward him fully now.

  “So no,” she said calmly. “The gate did not collapse.”

  Ishrael hesitated.

  “That’s not the only part of the rumor.”

  Washia’s eyes narrowed slightly.

  “Go on.”

  “They’re saying something carved through it.”

  Washia did not move.

  “Carved,” she repeated slowly.

  Ishrael nodded.

  “And not just the gate.”

  He gestured vaguely upward toward the world above.

  “The surrounding terrain too.”

  Washia stared at him.

  Then she turned slowly and walked back toward the central worktable.

  For a long moment she said nothing.

  Her fingers absently picked up a small crystal tool, rotating it slowly while her mind worked through the implications.

  “Let me understand this correctly,” she said finally.

  She looked up again.

  “You’re telling me something cut through the gate…”

  Her gaze drifted toward the reactor core humming softly behind her.

  “…and the surrounding terrain.”

  Ishrael nodded again.

  Washia’s lightning-veins began to glow faintly along her temples.

  “So,” she murmured.

  Her eyes unfocused slightly as calculations began forming behind them.

  “So it carved through power…”

  She tapped the crystal tool against the table.

  “…and mass.”

  Silence settled across the lab.

  The reactors continued their steady cycling overhead.

  A glass container bubbled quietly somewhere in the background.

  Washia’s expression slowly changed.

  First confusion.

  Then curiosity.

  Then something else.

  Understanding.

  “Oh.”

  The word escaped her almost reverently.

  “Oh that’s… interesting.”

  Ishrael shifted nervously.

  “Master Washia?”

  She didn’t answer him.

  Her eyes had gone distant now, staring at nothing while the pieces of the puzzle slid into place.

  “Cut through stabilized mana lattice…”

  She began pacing again.

  “Enough force to destabilize dimensional tension…”

  She stopped suddenly.

  Her head tilted.

  A faint smile appeared.

  Then she started laughing a quiet, delighted laugh.

  “Oh that’s beautiful.”

  Ishrael blinked.

  Washia spun around to face him again, her eyes now shining with excited intelligence.

  “Do you understand what you’ve just told me?”

  He shook his head slowly.

  “No.”

  Washia grinned.

  “There are only two forces in existence capable of cutting through a stabilized gate lattice.”

  She raised two fingers.

  “One.”

  She lowered a finger.

  “Dimensional collapse.”

  Then she lowered the second.

  “Two.”

  She leaned closer to him.

  “Void interaction.”

  Ishrael frowned.

  “Void?”

  Washia nodded slowly.

  “Specifically…”

  She tapped the table with the crystal tool.

  “…void manifested through an extremely powerful entity.”

  Ishrael stared at her blankly.

  Washia sighed.

  “In simpler terms.”

  She leaned back against the table again.

  “There is only one being I have ever personally seen carve through mana structures like that.”

  Ishrael swallowed.

  “…who?”

  Washia’s smile widened.

  “And that,” she said softly, “is the interesting part.”

  Her gaze drifted toward the instruments mounted along the far wall of the lab.

  Several of them were now flickering faintly.

  Mana readings.

  Resonance monitors.

  Washia pushed away from the table and slithered across the room toward them.

  Her fingers danced across a control panel, activating several displays at once.

  Graphs appeared.

  Oscillating energy patterns.

  Mana resonance spikes.

  Washia studied them for a moment.

  Then her smile slowly returned.

  “Oh.”

  Her shoulders began shaking again.

  This time the laughter came louder.

  Warmer.

  Triumphant.

  Ishrael watched nervously.

  “Master Washia?”

  She wiped a tear from the corner of one eye.

  “You know what this means?”

  “No.”

  Washia leaned back against the console.

  Her lightning-veins now glowed brightly across her scales.

  For the first time since Ishrael had known her…

  She looked genuinely happy.

  “Oh Ishrael…”

  She chuckled softly.

  “…I think a dead man just proved he isn’t.”

  She tilted her head back slightly.

  And then she began to cackle.

  “So he lives after all.”