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Chapter 165: The Science of Magic

Geoff helped his boyfriend through the portal into the Elemental Plane of Darkness before moving off to one side. Snow, the 'main one' or however the multi-bodied dog referred to his...'parts,' was there waiting, with most of his other selves settled in a loose circle around the portal. Geoff raised a fist toward the giant beast and nodded.

Snow blinked at him. The dark purple eyes seemed to radiate confusion for a moment before lowering his head to bump the top of his skull against Geoff's paw. A faint greeting-like grumble rose from deep in the barrel-like chest.

Behind him, Geoff felt the rich darkness vanish as Nathanial's ward came into being. Faelen, Liam, Agent Jay, and then Mr. Doull's scents all quickly filled the air. He had to suppress a growl as he thought about Liam. 'He's being such an arsehole today! What the hells is going on with him?' Geoff walked outside the ward and turned around to see what everyone was doing.

Nathanial, sweet, adorable, and fucking hot Nathanial was just exiting the ward to join him. Faelen stood near the edge of the ward and was doing his best to examine the area around Geoff for visible threats. Jay wasn't moving much; he stood near the centre of the circle and slowly panned around to take everything in, starting from the horizon judging on his eye elevation. Mr. Doull carefully picked his way toward the purplish glow marking the edge of the safe zone -- their safe zone -- and seemed to be trying to flick through as many of his umpteen lenses as he could per second. What use could that possibly be? Shouldn't he pause at each one to get a chance to see what changed? And arsehole Ancient One stood right beside the portal entrance, smiling radiantly as he visibly quivered with excitement. Geoff arched an eyebrow at that. 'We're in the Plane of Darkness. So what? It's not that big of a deal.'

"Ah, Hermes, I've travelled many places through the years, but--" Liam paused to chortle, er, Lowell did anyway. "This may be the most remarkable one of all." The Rottie pulled out a couple of rooster tail feathers before piling up a mix of rocks from Earth and here. Once the small pile was made, he placed the feathers on it and bowed his head for a moment. "Hermes Diaktoros, please watch over us as we journey through this forbidden land."

His prayer didn't go unheard by Jay and Mr. Doull. They both visibly started. Jay almost turned around, but stopped himself and kept his methodical scan going -- he had lowered his chin by a few finger widths and was on his second rotation. Mr. Doull actually stopped what he was doing and joined Liam at the impromptu altar. The Walrus rummaged in his duffel bag for a short bit before pulling out a stone carving of the Wanderer. He placed it on the stones and repeated Liam's prayer.

Liam jumped to his hindpaws and clapped his paw on Mr. Doull's beefy shoulder. "Now, my fellow, that the formalities are done, let the play begin." Trotting away from the stunned Mage, he approached Faelen at the edge of the ward. "Such a pity time is limited. The opportunity to study the geology of a truly alien landscape is one I'm loath to pass up, but..." He sighed in an almost theatrical manner. "Now, where's my journal? I should make sure to record all this for posterity. Aoife would love to read about this when she's a bit older." Yeah, he's lost in time.

Faelen leant over to whisper in Liam's ear. "Liam, remember when and where you are. I don't want you wandering out of the wards thinking you're still in Ireland."

Snow grumbled at Geoff. It sounded like he was wondering what everyone was doing.

"Science." Snow looked at him and then Nathanial.

Nathanial wrapped his arm around Snow's neck as best he could before rubbing his cheek against Snow's. "You're getting better at understanding Snow, eh, Geoff?"

Geoff shrugged. "I guess so. I have no idea what the noises mean, but somehow the gist comes through."

"Then you have an idea what he's saying, yeah?" Nathanial didn't wait for an answer after pointing out his contradiction. "Geoff means they're here to try to figure out my ward by studying it, and they're also really keen to look at your home. None of our species have ever managed to come here and return safely." Geoff didn't have a chance to point out Nathanial's contradiction before the Akita raised his head. "Oh! Guys! I'm shutting the portal." Both Jay and Mr. Doull turned to look at it with a bit of panic and watched their way back vanish.

The Jackal laughed nervously. "Ah, eh, yeah... In the deadliest plane known to Mages, with the door not only shut, but totally gone. Yeah. I'm good. All good." He looked at the small altar. "Hermes, my righteous bro, we're tight?" He thumped his chest with a closed fist. "You'll see us home?" The Walrus looked almost nauseous. Even Faelen looked somewhat wary, though Liam showed no fear, just a dampening of his bizarre enthusiasm.

Nathanial smiled. "Don't worry, Jay, I've been here maybe a dozen times, and I've only been in danger once or twice. Snow's keeping all of the other inhabitants away, so you just need to stay in the wards and nothing will happen."

Where was 'away'? Geoff had seen how populous this place could be, and the deceptively barren landscape should have some movement visible in the distance. Those giant silhouettes were at least five metres tall and would loom over the broken stone piles, no matter how many kilometres away they were.

Before Geoff could ask his question, Mr. Doull harrumphed. "That's good, but I wish you'd created this ward properly. Without chants, diagrams, or even time taken to weave the magic, you didn't give much to work with."

Liam nodded. "Every mystery requires some clues in order to be solved, but not all clues are given freely. Let us search for them before conceding defeat. Agent Jay has not even finished his initial survey." A fair statement, Geoff thought.

"I wasn't giving up; far from it. I was just saying this isn't going to be easy or quick."

Liam arched an eyebrow. "Hence my desire to avoid wasting time prior to coming here."

Nathanial clapped his paws before grinning at Faelen. "Right! No wasting time, eh? Faelen, I'm guessing you've been ignoring the approaching midterms." Geoff's best mate looked like an interrogation spotlight had just flicked on. "What are the components of an atom and their approximate weights? To three decimal places, please." No starting off easy. Nathanial would make a terrifying school teacher, a good one maybe, but the bane of coasting students for sure.

Faelen stammered, caught completely off guard.

---

Geoff sat for the next hour, occasionally trying to talk to Snow, fielding the odd question from Nathanial, and generally doing his best to stave off boredom. Poor Faelen looked like he wished he was bored; his shirt was soaked at the pits and his mid-back where the neck ruff tapered off.

Nathanial was as relaxed, patient, and engaged in tutoring as he was at the beginning, but he must've decided to take pity on his quarry. "That's enough for now." He glanced past Faelen to the three researchers. Geoff didn't bother; they were still doing the same crap they had been for the last hour, and it was just as opaque to him now as then.

Before Nathanial could go on, Geoff asked the question he'd been wanting to since before the impromptu tutoring. "Snow, you said earlier, or Nathanial did for you, that those other creatures were kept 'away.' Where is 'away'? How far? Kilometres? Tens of kilometres? How do you do that?"

Liam and the other three paused in their work. Nathanial and Snow both... all?... cocked their heads in confusion. There were sixteen in total, with four Snows missing. "Eh?"

Jay nodded. "Yeah, Snow-bro, I'm not picking up any movement on my glasses. This place is as flat as Kansas or Saskatchewan; I should be able to see something. Where are the Geckos of Doom, or those giant nightcrawlers?"

The mastiff muttered at Nathanial. Geoff shook his head. "That really doesn't help." The dog had said they weren't where he was. Obviously, but how or where?

Nathanial frowned. "He's right. Can you elaborate? We see they aren't around, but you should be able to say where the closest one is."

One of the smaller ones, about two metres behind Nathanial and three to the left of Geoff pointed his muzzle at a spot between the bipeds. They instantly jumped away. Nathanial squawked, "Wahh!" He landed facing the vacant area, panting. "Th-There's nothing there! I can't s-sense a thing!"

An answering mutter came from several throats with an 'of course not' feeling. Because they weren't where Snow was, naturally.

"If they aren't around because of you, then how can one be so close?" The response was just as unhelpful. "Because it didn't challenge you? What does that even mean?" Geoff really wished he could actually understand what the dog was saying. Looking at Faelen, Jay, and Mr. Doull, he felt a bit better. They only got half of the conversation, while Geoff got two-thirds, maybe.

Liam's fountain pen stilled over a page in his journal."Hold on, lad. Let me, please." The rest was in 'dog.' Great, now he could understand less than a quarter. With a limited frame of reference, Snow's noises made even less sense.

After a few back and forths, Liam's forehead furrowed. "I'm paraphrasing here, but I'll try to translate with the most accurate terms. He's established a 'domain' -- the word has a more commanding sense than 'home' or 'area.' His 'domain' is wherever he is, so it must be mobile, and in order for something to enter it, they need to challenge him. I'm guessing it's a competition between the collective energy of Snow versus that of the challenger, but it sounds like the challenger can enter anyway. No, I can't get a clearer answer without spending more time."

Nathanial cut in. "It's not an arm wrestle challenge. They can feel their comparative strength, and the outsider can decide to take the risk after. If it comes in, then it's a direct challenge to Snow and will provoke a life-or-death fight. The nature of the domain sounds like he carves a pocket dimension out, but it's something any Dark Plane resident can do." The Akita tapped his muzzle. "Some tabletop RPGs I read about called this a 'morphic' attribute of the plane. Those with stronger wills can freely alter aspects of the plane around them."

Faelen pointed down at his hindpaws. "So is this your domain, Nathanial? One you 'morphed' to remove the harmful effects of the Elemental Plane of Darkness?"

A blank expression was his answer. Geoff could almost hear the pup's thoughts. 'Eh? U-Um... Maybe? I just do it, I'm not sure what it is.'

Liam sighed, pinched the bridge of his muzzle between his eyes, and voiced Geoff's guess. "You have no idea, do you, lad?"

Nathanial cringed and scuffed the dusty ground with a hindpaw. Even the Spirits could barely hear his faint, "No..." squeak out.

Jay quearied, "So, how do we test it without killing ourselves? Can we double up...? I guess bro has a, er, domain inside Snow-bro's, so it should be smooth sailing, but if we wipe out..."

Faelen clenched a paw, the one that got hit by the planar energy before. "It isn't instant death. As long as Nathanial can catch the drained energy before it's consumed or dissipates, we can recover, but it hurts like all hells." He took a deep breath. "Experiment. If we can establish our own domain, we can step out one at a time."

Mr. Doull harrumphed, before flicking a few lenses. "I'd prefer to verify if this is a modified bit of the Elemental Plane of Darkness before doing something so dangerous."

Geoff shrugged. "Sure, but Faelen can't help with that, so he can experiment on this possibility." He turned to his oldest mate and grinned. "Go on, fog up." Faelen was already manifested, of course, but his domain would be full of mist.

Faelen's ears flicked uncertainly. "I have no idea how to even start."

Nathanial smiled patiently. "By trying. Try the same way you did in training. Focus on what you want to happen and ignore the technical stuff. Let the magic fill in the piddly little details."

Jay choked, and Mr. Doull dropped his glasses. They bounced at the end of their chain, ignored. The Walrus, master of Mage magic, sounded like he'd just heard the worst blasphemy a Mage could utter. "Na-tha-nial! Wh-- How-- That's not how magic works! Detail builds up the picture, not the other way around! If you don't have everything worked out perfectly, then when..." His small eyes narrowed into slits. "You never do, do you? Yet it all works out mostly how you want. Usually. But when it doesn't, like the last test..." Warded rooms get trashed, people's lives are endangered, and those things Nathanial are terrified of show up.

The poor Akita was unable to coherently respond. Geoff shook his head. "It does work. Unless he pushes to try to impress the ones testing him, or something else interferes -- like those portal monster things or a god. What other times have his magic spells screwed up?"

Liam ticked his fingers. "The harbour: Lord Hades' soul fire causing a feedback loop. The test: inserting too much Dark magic into a spell he had never cast. The healing of that Knight at the airport: direct interference by the thunder god. Are there any others? Does your magic function so well, especially with divine interference? Agent Arrie's? How did it do when faced with the severed arm?"

Agent Jay looked away. "Gods do what gods will. No one can guarantee anything when they're mucking about."

Geoff twitched his ears. Faelen was faintly muttering something with his eyes closed. 'I claim this area'? What...? Ah, claiming a domain. He must be trying to prove Nathanial right.'

Liam practically radiated smug superiority. "Then we are down to one example, yes? When he pushed into areas beyond his comfort at the improper insistence of your testers? Even that technically worked, though he lost control of the summons. And you appear to be acceding to his abnormal success rate."

Mr. Doull placed his glasses back on his nose. "No argument on his successful modifications, but we have centuries of studies. Magic is crafted from details, as letters form words, words form sentences, sentences form paragraphs. It can't go the other way, just like..." He appeared to gesture to the barren expanse beyond the ward before stopping at the implications.

Silence descended. Most looked at Nathanial standing unprotected amidst the lethal atmosphere of the deadliest Elemental Planes. Mage magic didn't work that way, nor could a Mage survive a trip here; no spell had ever allowed one to live even a single second, as far as Geoff understood it.

Nathanial cringed under their silent gazes to the point he was almost prone. "I-I-I... eh?" The poor Akita suddenly looked at Faelen. "That's...odd?" Small wisps of mist flickered in and out of existence around Faelen. "I feel a weak...push against my mind."

Geoff thought Snow's grumble carried an eye-rolling tone to it. 'A challenge? I guess it means that by trying to form a domain, Faelen is challenging Nathanial's domain. But if Nathanial can overlay his on Snow's, then Faelen should be able to do the same thing.'

Nathanial nodded toward the four-legged canine. "Okay." The Akita slowly exhaled and the mist around Faelen became a little more consistent. It still didn't extend far from his body or seem all that stable. Nathanial tapped his muzzle and paced back and forth in front of Faelen, still on this side of the barrier protecting everyone else, though. "Hmm..." The mist was a mere thirty centimetres or so thick, when the domain seemed to function properly, otherwise it collapsed back to a centimetre from Faelen's fur. Would that still protect him? Could a mere finger-width of vapour stop his life energy from being ripped away? Geoff wouldn't trust it, were it him.

Liam had a thought-filled frown on his face, too. He, and the other two science nerds, did what they could to study the frail space. Even Snow faintly growled and began roving about...but he didn't seem to care about what Faelen had done. Actually, the main body spent most of his time staring at the spot he said a planar creature was; the other Snows focused on different locations nearby...very nearby.

Geoff whispered to a smallish Snow body passing behind him, "Are they focusing on me?" A faint mutter came back. "His fear drew their attention, then they noticed me? Am I that, er, weak feeling?" The answer seemed to say the power/food difference was too out of whack to make it easy to resist. "Uh... Oh. So... how--?" Before he could ask, an agonizing bolt of pain lanced up his tail through his spine, followed by a millisecond of darkness. Geoff reappeared a few metres away with the small Snow chomping down on his tail and the sight of a fecking huge maw rupturing the ground where they just were.

A Dark Worm!

All of the Snows launched themselves at it, including tail-biter, with frightful snarls and barks. Geoff felt something behind him and conjured sharp claws over his paws as he spun to face it. It was a Gecko of Doom! The thick tongue struck his new talons and the lizard drew his tongue back, almost pulling Geoff off balance since it had fastened to him. He stepped forward into the archer stance Liam taught them in order to catch himself, and slashed at the tongue with the other paw. The gecko released him, and withdrew its tongue completely. Before he could congratulate himself, Geoff felt something else appear behind him. The Elemental leapt up as high as he could and created a pair of wings to climb even higher. A Shadow Mastiff passed beneath him, almost taking off Geoff's hindpaws with its snapping fangs. 'Yikes! Time to dragon up!' He flapped furiously, noting there were more and more beasties appearing below him.

The Dark Worm had drawn the attention of almost everyone else; the Snows were blinking in and out around it as they bit, but while they moved too quickly for the worm to retaliate, its hide was too thick for them to do more than annoy it. That wasn't the case for Mr. Doull: he seemed to have cast a spell that locked the ground around it, preventing the monster from advancing or retreating, as shown by the ice slowly climbing up from the hole, and then Geoff winced when a thunderous clap of lightning and fire blasted down from the sky. Part of it went into the worm's mouth, but it managed to avoid searing most of its relatively tender innards. The furious roar could barely be heard over the ringing in Geoff's ears.

The roar caught for a second and mixed with a keen of pain. Three blazing throwing knives blossomed in the some of the tiny eyes ringing the worm's...head? Liam held his sword, but rather than attacking, he appeared to be concentrating on something. Bluish-green light began spreading out around him, similar in appearance to Nathanial's purple domain barrier.

Jay held an old-looking bandage in both paws and finished casting what looked like a very complicated spell. Four Jackal-like mummies, complete with Egyptian headgear, appeared around the Worm and stabbed up into it with long spears. They braced the butts of their spears on the ground before drawing curved bronze swords. Bronze? How old was that spell?

Faelen was the only one that'd directly moved to help him. The Mist Spirit had actually jumped out of Nathanial's wards and smashed a couple fog bombs. Geoff couldn't tell what was part of his best mate's domain and what part was the artificial fog, but it seemed Faelen had merged into the vapour to good effect regardless. Faelen was doing something Geoff couldn't make out, because the beasts that had been attacking Geoff turned on each other.

Nathanial exhaled at the same time all of Snow's bodies suddenly jumped away. His domain grew twice as large before anyone else could react, catching the Worm and several fog-covered Geckos in it. All of them writhed and frantically tried to flee. One of the Geckoes didn't make it before its strength gave out, and it collapsed at the edge of the ward; black wisps of smoke began rising off of it as it began disintegrating. The Worm struggled to withdraw into the ground, snapping two of the spears, but the ice and other two held. Its shrieks rose in volume. Geoff noted Nathanial's domain was now a mere dozen centimetres below his hindpaws. What would happen to him if he'd been caught in it? Nathanial probably had intentionally stopped expanding it before that happened. Huh, a bit farther away were a couple Mastiffs that seemed to have been flung away, by telekinetically thrown rocks, perhaps?

Snow, the main Snow, eyed Nathanial's domain for a second, while the other hims pounced on the fallen Mastiffs and tore their throats out. The dogs vanished into puffs of smoke, which were quickly consumed. Inside the barrier, the Dark Worm was getting more frantic. It began spewing acid every which way, including down its sides, in an attempt to break free.

Nathanial, Jay, and Mr. Doull stopped everything else they were doing in order to raise shields. Even though the mummies were shielded, a direct blast of acid rained down on them and instantly caused the powerful Shield spells to shatter.

Mr. Doull and Jay staggered back in shock. The Walrus waved his flippers. "Shield Delta Alpha Four!" The regular pale purple discs vanished only to be replaced by black-veined green ones.

Liam was already at the edge of the domain, he seemed to think his sword would be ineffective against the gigantic monster, and instead plunged through the purple wall. His Hades-tinted domain sprang out to cover two metres, and held strongly against the encroaching darkness. Three non-Snow Mastiffs noticed him, and leapt. Liam let loose a booming laugh, and speared his sword right through the mouth and brain of the closest. It burst into smoke as it died. The tan paw caught the next by the throat and spun it over to smash into the third.

Geoff stopped flapping his wings in surprise. That wasn't Liam's fighting style, any of the Liams he was familiar with. The Ancient One even looked more muscular than usual. Of course he might be imagining things.

Meanwhile, Nathanial ignored all that and ran at the Worm, instead. He jumped onto it, his small claws digging into the coarse flesh for balance, and began climbing.

"What the hells are you doing?!" Geoff couldn't help yelling. He still struggled to right himself after Liam's antics threw him off balance, and this shock wasn't helping. Geoff created his dragon doll and possessed it. That helped. He swooped over the top of the domain and shot several balls of shadow-stuff down at the mouth of the worm, trying to stop it from ejecting more acid.

It didn't help. The Worm saw these orbs descending like meteors and spat viscous globs of acid back up at them. Just in case, Geoff veered aside. It was good he did; as soon as his attacks hit the domain edge, they quickly lost cohesion. The acid rose unchallenged. The worm had the same thought as Geoff, and also flung its upper body away from the path of Geoff's attacks, throwing Nathanial off it.

The small Akita cackled as his body traced an arc through the air. "Writhing, slithing bits of black, spring forth and fling me back!" Dozens of surging tentacles, sporting cruel thorns, breached the rocky ground. Nathanial landed on the end of one and, like a shuttlecock in a game of badminton, he was returned to the sender.

Geoff glared at the purple dome preventing him from helping his boyfriend, but there really wasn't anything he could do to it. There wasn't any way he could not watch in frustration, however. Did that mean he had to leave Faelen and Liam on their own? Nah, a dozen-odd animated bombs would suffice.

While the constructs took form, Nathanial's summons wrapped around the writhing Worm. The suction cups and thorns? -- claws? -- held fast on its hide, finally pinning it down, just in time for the Akita to land on it. Mr. Doull had a flipper held up, and a rapidly rotating arrow of energy took shape above his stubby fingers before darting at the monster. The arrow pierced deeply.

Nathanial ignored the keening, shaking mass beneath his hindpaws. He strolled up to its eyes, letting Agent Jay and Mr. Doull strike it at will. The Akita crouched over an eye and peered down at it. It wasn't just his prey that watched Nathanial warily, now; the two Mages also stopped their attacks. "Vermian beast, beneath my feets, tremble in fear today. I tie thee down, upon the ground, your life to drain away. Feed me now, where you bow, 'fore I go to play. Through the Dark, such a lark, yet forever you shall lay." Nathanial placed his paw over the tiny eye. The sound of shattering rocks echoed, and the many ton creature bounced beneath the constricting tentacles.

Even those fighting outside of the dome stopped at the noise. On seeing the dead Dark Worm, it took less than a second for only the Snows, Faelen, and Liam to be left.

Jay looked wistfully at the Worm for a moment. "Huh?" The Jackal turned his head to where Faelen and Liam had been fighting, then back again. "Why is it still here? Everything else poofed once their best-before date passed. What gives this squirmy such a late expiration?" He tapped on the frame of his sunglasses. "Even the doggos and Geckos of Doom are gone, but we've seen their corpses before." Geoff looked around. Jay was right; there weren't any other corpses.

Nathanial blinked a few times before calling up to Geoff. "U-Um, you can come down, now, if you want. You sh-should probably stay in that shape, though. It seems to deter the other residents." The Dark Worm wasn't smoking, so Nathanial must've altered his domain.

The main Snow muttered at the Jackal and then the Akita. He didn't know, and he wasn't going to keep his domain. Geoff felt a slight shift in the environment; all around creatures suddenly appeared, but they were hightailing it out of there.

Jay and Faelen made startled noises, but Liam calmly said, "Snow is unaware of the cause behind our cadaverous anomaly. He has kindly released his domain so that we will no longer be caught off guard should hostile entities decide to attack." Liam was back in control, from the sounds of it. The Rottie followed a fog cloud into the purple dome; the fog lowered enough that Faelen's upper body was exposed and the bluish light around Liam vanished.

Nathanial's eyes brightened. "Yeah, speaking of, now that we can move around, I want to show you guys something. It's a skeleton -- a non-Fur skeleton -- and a medallion."