Leveling up the World

Chapter 998: The Weight of Magic

Security was tight with the mission under way. No civilians were allowed within the vital area of the launch pad, and there was enough security to see to that. Of course, that didn’t hold true for everyone.

“This way,” Alien said, wearing a suit that didn’t fit him in the least.

It wasn’t the clothes that mattered, but the ident badge that gave him access to everywhere within the facility. Not only that, but the authority it contained made sure that everyone had to be nice to him.

Security let them pass through with little more than a glance as the two headed to the suit-up room. There, four astronauts stood ready, dressed in space gear.

“Gentlemen,” Alien said, moving forward to shake their hands one by one.

As each of their hands came into contact with him, an echo was placed within the person—an echo that made them highly susceptible to certain suggestions. As he did, Dallion went up to the person that was closest to him in height.

“Thanks,” he said. “I’ll be taking it from here.”

The other nodded and sat back down. From this moment on, Dallion was going to be that person, and the echo within everyone completely agreed.

“You should be fine from here,” Alien whispered to Dallion. “Remember. You only have enough air for—”

“I know.” Dallion sighed. They had been over this one too many times for his taste. “I’ll be fine,” he lied. “Thanks, Alien. I owe you one.”

“Yeah, right,” the other laughed. “I’ll be sure to remember that.” He looked around. “I better get to mission control to handle things there.” He turned around, walking out of the room as quickly as possible.

Alright, Dallion thought. Time to go to the elevator.

“Anyone heard why they rushed the schedule?” one of the astronauts asked.

“Why else? Pentagon crap.”

“Must be a big deal. Even the usual suspects don’t know anything.”

“Yeah, getting a personal visit from the big man himself should say it all.”

Ready for the last zap, Aqui? Dallion asked mentally as the elevator went up. From there, the four were to go to a vehicle that would take them to the launch pad.

I’m not a Moon! Aquilequia grumbled. Soon!

The truth was that Dallion didn’t need to have the final skill just yet. He’d have days before he got anywhere near the moon itself. Everything was just a distraction to stop him from thinking about what was to follow.

The vehicle stopped, at which point the final trip to the capsule began. If anything was to go wrong, it would be now. To his surprise, nothing remotely alarming occurred. The weather continued to be fine. There were no sudden earthquakes or distant tsunamis—just another day perfect for launch.

Dallion walked along the access walkway, over two hundred feet above the ground. Any other day, the event would have been streamed all over the globe. Alien, however, had used his influence to persuade the powers that be to keep it low key. While undoubtedly the launch was a major event worthy of publicity, security issues always trumped everything else. The reason for this—to ensure that as few people as possible witnessed what was about to occur.

“You feeling, okay?” one of Dallion’s “fellow astronauts” asked.

Dallion just nodded best he could in the spacesuit, then picked up the pace to catch up to the other three. Although everyone was convinced he was their colleague with years of training and experience, he couldn’t allow himself to make stupid mistakes.

“Just taking one last look,” Dallion said, using his music skills to calm people down.

“I hear you,” the other astronaut laughed.

Taking a deep breath, Dallion rushed to the entrance hatch. He had done some basic training in Alien’s realm as to how to enter. Doing the real thing felt a lot more final.

“You can head back,” he said to the three others.

As he did, a bubble of void emerged around the trio, making them virtually invisible to people and equipment alike. Any observant awakened would notice a minuscule magic portal on the walkway from where void matter leaked out. The intuitive would also notice that there was a similar one in mission control, where a fashion celebrity was sitting, along with his assistant.

The celebrity had made massive contributions to NASA, it seemed, and would attract a lot more with the publicity they would bring to the mission. Naturally, no one saw any contrast between that and the new security measures that had been put in place.

“Keeping up?” Jeremy turned to Jenna.

While he had some void matter of his own, it was nowhere nearly enough to match what she was doing. For that reason, he didn’t even bother, focusing on maintaining the magic portal instead.

“It’s fine,” she nodded, even if it was apparent the exercise was sapping her strength.

“Just a few more minutes,” Jeremy whispered. “You just need to get them in the car.”

Meanwhile, Dallion closed the hatch and took his seat.

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Drawing magic from the industrial magnet he was carrying, he started casting the control override spell. In the process, he also had to be careful not to disrupt the series of illusions placed on the magnet to keep it from going amuck.

Testing, testing. Katka’s voice echoed in Dallion’s head.

Dallion smirked. As much as he wanted to reply, that would be a spell too many. All he could do was listen.

Alien will rush the schedule some more, which means you have ten minutes once the rest of the crew are safely away.

Dallion kept on pulling threads out of the magnet with one gloved hand while linking them to the control panel with the other. Everything had to be done according to a specific sequence or the whole thing would fail.

If you don’t manage by then, mission control can abort the mission and you’ll have more than the Moon to worry about.

“Very funny,” Dallion kept on working.

Katka and the old man were the observation team, keeping an eye on the wider area with hundreds of magic threads. Due to their involvement, the energy consumption from the grid had increased by eight percent. Thankfully, it was human nature to rationalize things in the most convenient way. Since there was a launch underway, people were all too quick to consider that to be the cause. If things didn’t stabilize after the rocket was up, then they would start a thorough investigation. By then, it would be too late to matter.

More and more aether threads filled the cabin. Two looms hung in the air—far sloppier than any Dallion had seen made—connecting everything with everything. One of them was to act as a control module, while the other served as a screen.

“T minus three hundred.” The announcement was made.

Five minutes? That was a bit less than Dallion would have wanted. Splitting into instances, he picked up the pace.

Everything still looks good. Katka’s voice resonated in Dallion’s mind again. Hope it’s all good on your end.

“It will be if you stop distracting me,” Dallion grumbled.

All control panels were linked at this point. All that was left was for him to add a chain of five-circle spells to several of the magic threads. One of his instances messed up, causing the spell to run wild and collapse on itself. Dallion instantly faded it, then split into a new set.

“T minus two hundred.” The countdown mercilessly went down.

Three of the five chains were complete, leaving two to go. Unfortunately, that didn’t make things easier. Space was starting to become an issue, requiring Dallion to concentrate even more. Making mistakes, even while combat splitting was becoming more and more frequent.

“T minus one hundred.”

Barely was the announcement made than Dallion started work on the final spell chain. One by one, the spell circles formed, filled with intricate magic symbols.

“T minus sixty.”

The countdown had gone down to a minute now. That was good. A minute was more than enough time for him to finish. Just to be on the safe side, Dallion started checking the connections with one of his instances.

The entire cabin shook as the engines were ignited. This was his cue to lie back in his seat before the acceleration could kick in. One of the benefits of being an awakened was that he could consider that as a guideline.

“Finally got you.” Dallion’s fingers stopped moving. He could barely see anything through the many magic threads, yet he didn’t have to. Images appeared on one of the aether-looms, providing him all the information he needed.

You better not have messed up, Kraisten’s voice boomed in Dallion’s mind. On the chance that you actually finished on time, good luck. Get there in one piece and don’t forget what you promised.

“You can bet on it, old man,” Dallion replied, even if there wasn’t anyone to hear him.

“T minus ten.”

Ten seconds to spare, Dallion thought and leaned back.

“T minus five.”

Four, Dallion counted. Three. Two. One.

Everything trembled as an invisible force pushed Dallion down into the seat. Choosing not to fight it, he relaxed and let things continue as they should.

Will you tip your hand, Astreza? He continued to maintain three instances.

The rocket thrust up into the air. Dallion could feel the magic of Kraisten and Katka fade away. Interestingly enough, he felt the Earth itself become more distant. It wasn’t much, but the constant magic background that the planet provided was a lot fainter as well.

Was Astreza actually letting him go? Had that been the Moon’s intention from the get go?

“What did you expect?” a voice asked from the seat next to Dallion.

Moments ago, the spot had been empty. Now, someone was sitting there, and not just anyone but the Blue Moon himself in the same form he’d been in during Dallion’s final battle in the awakened world.

“I’m not the one who’s going to stop you,” Astreza remarked.

“But the secret…”

“Is still a secret. In a few minutes, all your friends will forget. The Star might remember, but she’ll be a pain either way. It’s not anything unexpected. I brought her here before, remember?”

Everyone would forget? Dallion thought. All this time he had been so certain that the Moon would attack them in some fashion, possibly destroying a city or two in the process. The truth was that he didn’t have to. He was the world, the Moon of awakening, the person who offered people to be sent to another world to grow and defeat their demons, then made them forget all about it. Of course, he’d be able to pluck a thought from their minds.

“What about me?”

“Architect’s privilege,” The Moon said. “There are too few of you, so we let you do whatever you want.”

“What if I decide to take over the world?”

“Will you?” Astreze tilted his head.

“No,” Dallion admitted. “But what if the next one does?”

“Why hasn’t the previous one done it? To become Architect, you have to defeat all your demons. It’s the greatest pinnacle there is—the final level of awakening. You don’t feel the need to conquer the world, because that’s not important to you anymore.”

“So, you’ll let me get back?” Dallion asked. He found the Moon’s attitude suspiciously calm.

“As I said, I’m not the one who’d stop you. You found the truth and the means on your own. You’re the master of your own life.”

“Just like that?”

“Just like that.” The Blue Moon paused, as if a new thought had popped into his head. “I’ll have to leave you now. You’re almost too far away. Before that, let me give you one piece of advice.” He leaned closer to Dallion. “Magic also has weight.”

“Magic has weight?” Dallion asked. “What does that mean?”

Before he could get an answer, the entire control panel lit up. All lights that could flash were doing so, along with both aether-looms.

“What happened?” Dallion focused on the loom with all of his instances.

According to the readings, the energy released from the engines had changed direction. More specifically, ninety percent of the thrust kept on propelling the rocket upwards, while the rest was pushing it back down.

“Did you do this?” Dallion turned to where the Moon had been, but only found an empty seat.