Aetheral Space

Let me tell you a story about a certain man. Don't worry -- it won't take long.

This story takes place on a planet, in a city, in a house, where a baby was born to parents. I'm sure you'd like more specific information than that. Unfortunately, that's not possible. Even if you were to ask the man this story is about for more details, he'd be unable to give them to you.

It's not that these details were taken from him. No amnesia or trauma has wiped his mind clean. It's simply that, to this man, the only things that exist are the things that interest him.

All else is mere trivia.

So let me tell you this story, in full:

On a planet, in a city, in a house, a baby was born to parents. Perhaps this was at night-time, perhaps this was during the day. Whatever the case, when that baby came into the world, it did three things for the very first time.

For the first time, it opened its eyes.

For the first time, it let out a wail.

And, for the first time… rainbow Aether sparked.

So the story goes. Every word of it is true.

The Shepherdess had considered many people for the throne of the Supreme.

Ruth Blaine was her prime candidate now, but she'd given all their due consideration. Avaman the Announcer, master of the winds. Atoy Muzazi, the moonlit swordsman. Mereloco, the shade from the past. The Sixth Dead, the madwoman with a taste for blood. Dragan Hadrien.

The list went on -- the strongest she could find, with the most potential for future growth -- but there were two she'd very intentionally left off of it.

First was Niain. Needless to say, there was no way she would ever allow that wretch to claim the throne of the Supreme. She doubted the freak even wanted it, but if things ever looked like he'd ascend the throne she'd rather the Supremacy itself collapse than give it to him.

He was the shadow, the enemy at the gates. He was the sort of danger Azez had formed the Supremacy against. His victory would mean the end of everything.

It didn't bear thinking about.

The second was Wu Ming. At first, this hadn't been a conscious thing. She'd only realized that she'd been avoiding the thought of the Clown of the Supremacy once she'd finished investigating the other three Contenders.

When she thought about power, he was certainly up there, but when she thought about power that could be harnessed? No way.

He was like hot metal, forcing her to recoil at the touch. Wu Ming was simply too much. A force that repelled all reason and all reasonable.

He shouldn't be able to use his Aether so effortlessly.

He shouldn't be able to have so many abilities.

He shouldn't be able to develop more at such an absurd speed.

Aether was a light of the mind, yes, but it was also a power bound by rules. Every Aether-user developed their strength and abilities by working around those laws. But there was an exception to every rule… and that exception was named Wu Ming.

Monster.

The Shepherdess had been loath to use additional resources against the rampaging Ruth Blaine. Against Wu Ming, though? She didn't hesitate.

Hands moving with all the speed her body would allow, she hurled two emerald marbles forward, her Aether flowing into and activating them.

“Devil Core!” she roared, as the marbles erupted into light. “Draconic Devil!”

The single-use Aether Armaments exploded outwards, a crystal shell growing from the tiny marbles until they were no longer visible. Instead, within mere seconds, they were simply the cores of two massive serpentine dragons, their crystalline bodies sharp and ready to eviscerate.

As one, the two train-sized beasts flowed through the air towards the descending Wu Ming, their jaws opening in silent roars.

He met them with a cheeky grin of his own.

“Oh, we're playing toy soldiers?” he said. “Sure, sure, let's do it, honey! Arachnis Sapiens!”

A bundle of string tore its way free from his extended fingers -- and from that string crawled out a massive beast of Ming’s own design. It was grotesque, a hybrid between a malformed human and a colossal spider, eight pillar-like legs skittering on the ground far below it.

Haphazard yellow eyes bulged in fury as the creature met the Draconic Devils with a one-two jab, repelling their initial attacks and sending shards of crystal raining down.

“Wait!” Wu Ming cried out as he landed on the spiderman's shoulder. “Wait, I changed my mind! Arachnis Rex! I wanna call this one Arachnis Rex!”

The Shepherdess clicked her tongue as she clambered onto the rocky back of one of the Draconic Devils, glaring at the man opposite her. Her blood boiled. Aether-users were beautiful because of how they struggled against their limitations to produce power.

A child with no limitations at all was nothing but an eyesore.

She hurled a hail of throwing knives at the Clown of the Supremacy, their trajectory accelerated by Chronodissonance. The spider-creature was shredded apart by the rain of blades, but Wu Ming? Wu Ming just stood there, but Wu Ming did not die.

Instead, his body opened -- forming holes that the knives passed harmlessly through -- impacting the wall behind him. This was not a human body. Reports of the Fourth Contender's death had not been exaggerated, it seemed. This was an Aether Awakening she was fighting.

He leapt at her, and she retreated -- freezing parts of the shattered street to block his passage. Even so, the Clown advanced, the strings composing his body changing his shape with each leap. A man, a woman, a tiger, a koi fish… with each blow, another huge hole was opened up in a Draconic Devil -- and before long, both of them were rubble upon the ground.

There didn't seem to be much limit to Wu Ming's shapeshifting anymore. She'd expected something like this, but even so… a shiver went down her spine. This was how the Gene Tyrants had fought. The thousand-year terror in her bones stirred.

As they returned to the border of the construction site again, the Shepherdess threw out another volley of knives, forcing Ming to leap back and put some distance between them. He returned to his normal form as he landed. That damn bloody grin still went unbroken.

“I'm surprised,” he grinned, putting a hand against his bare hip as he leaned against the wall. “The Shepherdess and all, I thought you'd be right in my face. A battle for every second or something, you know? But you're lingering all the way at the back. Am I not good enough for you, darling… or is it just that you don't like fighting much?”

The Shepherdess' glare hardened into murder. “Don't presume to know me, Clown.”

Wu Ming snapped his fingers, red teeth gleaming in the light. He knew he'd got her. “Seriously, though,” he continued. “Even when you were fighting that chicken guy, you stayed out of sight and struck when he wasn't looking, right? You're more an assassin than a fighter. Nothing wrong with it, but still.”

“...the chicken guy?”

There was no way. She knew for a fact that Wu Ming hadn't been there when she'd eliminated Chicken Punk. If he had been, there's no way he would have been able to surprise her a few minutes ago.

Nobody was ever able to sneak up on the Shepherdess more than once… but, then again, that was nothing but a rule, wasn't it?

The exception grinned. “Yup -- and, he gave me a useful hint, too. How'd it go again? Hey, villain, right?”

The Shepherdess' eyes widened. He knew. This bastard knew how to get around Chronodissonance’s rewind and deal lasting damage. He had been there. He had seen Chicken Punk’s awakening.

Chronodissonance allowed the Shepherdess to simulate time manipulation on anything she infused. Naturally, that included her own body. Whenever she was hit by an attack, she could simply rewind time to erase the effects of said attack -- essentially making any non-lethal injury pointless.

However, at the moment a blow was landed on an Aether-user, their infusion wavered for just the tiniest fraction of a second. If, in that instant, the enemy infused the wound they’d dealt with their own Aether, they achieved sovereignty over it. The Shepherdess couldn't rewind or interfere with it at all.

Against an enemy like Wu Ming, being unable to heal could be fatal. She'd have to take desperate measures. She gritted her teeth: this was exactly what she'd wanted to avoid when fighting Ruth Blaine.

From her pocket, she whipped out another single-use Aether Armament, sourced directly from the Maker-Guild. A tiny humanoid figure, cut from paper, with a simple smile on its face. As she charged it with her Aether, the paper-man exploded…

“Whisper Troupe, Version 3.”

…into a horde of human-sized copies, all of which surged towards Ming and the unconscious Ruth Blaine like a tsunami.

No matter their numbers, they were still made of paper. Against Wu Ming, they wouldn't last long. But that was fine. They didn't need to last long. All they needed to do was give the Shepherdess the tiny fraction of time she needed.

Time to raise her hand up.

Time to coalesce her Aether into the proper apocalyptic structure.

Time to open her eyes and mouth, both of them now blazing with blinding pink Aether.

And time to speak.

“Time Crash.”

Let me tell you a story.

This story takes place on the planet Mionaught, during the twilight of the Gene Tyrant's empire. The world was ruled by a Tyrant named Alexandra, a noble of minor station and arrogance far beyond her means. Even as the revolution burnt across thousands of planets, she believed that her estate -- lying on the edges of galactic territory -- would be safe.

The war would soon be over, and the aggressors punished in ways hitherto unimaginable. This is what the Gene Tyrant Alexandra truly believed. As such, she took no notice of the wider world, and did what she was wont to do.

In short, she partook in genetic decadence.

The girl was born choking. Her first memory was of flailing her arms, tearing at the membrane before her, ripping her way out of the birthing sac before she drowned in the matter that had formed her. As she writhed out into open air, she collapsed onto the ground, heaving for breath.

She was born a child, not an infant. Alexandra didn't have the patience to wait for her creations to grow up. Awareness… reason… language… these things already existed inside her brain, ready-formed. Context without content. A crafted doll with a crafted consciousness.

The girl wasn't alone. This was Alexandra's latest distraction -- an attempt to create a perfect replica of her own preferred form. Perhaps she intended to use it as a body double in case assassins of the Blind Man came to Mionaught. Perhaps she just wanted someone to try on clothes for her.

Whatever the case, she demanded exactitude.

The Gene Tyrant herself stood high above the pit of writhing copies, her pink eyes scanning each and every one of her new creations. Her face was blank, expressionless -- she was the kind of organism that demonstrated emotion only when she wished to. The child empress, clad in flowing robes of velvet and diamond, put her hands together and slowly -- unnaturally -- smiled. The two mega-Pugnant guards at her side stood to attention.

“That one is acceptable,” Alexandra breathed, pointing down at the child. “Recycle the rest.”

Whenever the Shepherdess -- whenever Ruri -- thinks back to that moment, it becomes intertwined with another. The words that gave her life by pure coincidence are fused with the ones that gave her purpose through resolve. The words of the one that had saved her. The final wish that has guided her careful hands for one-thousand years.

“If our strength falters… they will come back. If the Supremacy falls… they will come back. I know it. I can see them. In my dreams… behind my eyes… they’re at the gates, always at the gates.

“Ruri, this Supremacy of mine… will you make it last?”

For that purpose, Ruri the Shepherdess would do anything.

It hung in the sky.

If the thing that the Shepherdess had summoned was a clock, then it was surely a clock used by the gods.

The construct was nearly the size of the Arena of the Absolute all by itself, flat face turned towards the city below like a great staring eye, each tick of the massive second-hand enough to make the air vibrate. Towers of gears and cogs rose above it, like the bones of time itself, and a thunderstorm of pink Aether broiled around its borders.

“Five.”

Time Crash spoke in a voice volcano-deep, loud enough to make glass shiver. Wu Ming grimaced, looking up at the colossus. The sphere he'd been creating wore away in his hands.

“Four.”

Time Crash was the Shepherdess' most potent ability. Unlike Chronodissonance, which required her to touch a target and infuse it with her Aether, Time Crash would take its satisfaction upon everything that walked the world below. Once it hit ‘zero’, everything within its six-kilometer range would be flooded and forcefully infused with absurd Aether -- everything save for the exceptions the Shepherdess had designated, of course.

“Three.”

In this case, that exception was Ruth Blaine alone. Wu Ming would have to swallow his pride and be subject to a rule for once. Already retreating into the shadows, the Shepherdess grinned.

“Two.”

Well… the Clown of the Supremacy wouldn't have to swallow his pride for very long. Chronodissonance rewinded, accelerated and erased time. Time Crash broke it.

That man would be lucky if he were allowed to even scream.

“One.”

Only… he looked up, and there was a grin on his face.

Only… he looked up, and he pointed his finger up towards Time Crash itself.

Only… he looked up, and his arm unraveled into string once more.

This time, when it reformed, it took on the shape of a long and spindly rifle barrel, pointed straight up towards the sky -- locked on to the center of Time Crash’s clock. Chaotic rainbow Aether broiled at the tip of the weapon. Ming's white-ring eyes shrunk down to pinpricks…

…and he spoke lethally.

“Der Frie --”

Cancel!

The Shepherdess didn't hesitate. The instant she realized what Wu Ming was doing, she canceled her ability and fled into the night. She hadn't survived a thousand years of combat by choosing the wrong battles.

Besides, she'd already gotten what she wanted.

Ruth Blaine's inferno had been lit.

Wu Ming let out a breath.

It was sad to see someone get defeated by themselves. It looked like the Shepherdess had overestimated him, and underestimated herself. If she'd pressed the attack, she'd have been able to beat him -- that Chronodissonance ability was just that good.

He let his hand return to being a hand and flapped it in the air. It wasn't as if he could actually use Der Freischütz. He was an Aether Awakening, after all -- if he tried to get an Aether-destroying shot off, he'd just blow himself up. Clearly the Shepherdess hadn't believed that, though.

Shrugging to himself, he strolled over to the unconscious Ruth. It was a shame what had happened to her -- Wu Ming had stuck with her these months in hopes of being able to fight the new-and-improved Dragan Hadrien while he waited for Darkstar to show themselves. He hadn't expected the Shepherdess to take the bait instead.

Oh, well. All's well that ends well.

He tapped Ruth with a foot of yarn.

“You alive?” he asked, cocking his head. “Looks like I've gotta get you up to speed.”

Let me tell you a funny story.

That child was born laughing.

The room it was born in was freezing. Those who delivered it were faceless doctors. The mother who had given it life no longer existed in this world. In truth, the child was not even expected to cry -- all present believed they'd be hearing nothing but a death-rattle, if that. Instead…

ha ha ha

From the moment it was born, the child was laughing.

Henri the Glutton fathered many candidates for the role of Supreme Heir. This was because he believed an environment filled with powerful rivals would drive his children to greatness. This was also because he was a gruesome man who liked to indulge himself.

It doesn't matter.

The eighth born child was a girl who could command swarms of locusts, directing them with orders both intricate and broad to devour her foes. She was the first to die. They found her in a hallway of the Shesha, stripped to the bone by the biting of countless flies.

ha ha ha

The seventh born child was a boy who considered himself a man -- a swordsman, at that. With a blade of flexile white bone he would cut down any who opposed him. His limbs were found scattered through an escape shuttle.

ha ha ha

The sixth born child believed himself to be invincible. He had honed two abilities -- a suit of impenetrable armour, and a regenerative power that allowed him to restore lost body parts. He was found in what remained of his quarters, helmet and skull smashed open like an egg.

ha ha ha

The fifth born child could split herself in two -- one to distract while another snuck up from behind. As such, she was never alone, and believed she could never be ambushed. She was wrong -- both of her. They were found run through on each others blades.

ha ha ha

The fourth born child could create familiars of shadow, hounds pure black and ready to devour. He sealed himself in the throne room of the Shesha and waited for the dread killer to face him personally. By the morning, he was a trail on the floor -- bitten in half by something far more monstrous than anything he could make.

ha ha ha

The third born child tried to run. He had always been a failure, never even developing his Aether, and he did not have the stomach for whatever this was. All that was left of him was found in the shuttle bay, a pulsing lump of something no longer human.

ha ha ha

The second born child, the prodigal daughter, could sculpt a world of her own design from the landscape around her. A domain as flexible as her own body, and as immovable as a native reality. She died, overpowered in every way, her world overwritten by another.

ha ha ha

The first born child, driven to despair by the ordeal of the last few days, trembled in his bed -- staring at the distant door. At the noise beyond it. When the servants came to wake him in the morning, he had already taken his own life out of fear.

But he needn't have been afraid.

ha ha ha

After all, the only thing at the door had been a laughing child.

And so Henri found his Heir.

Niain opened his eyes, and smiled as he saw the void stretch out before him. No dark, no light, no up, no down, no matter except him. A perfect absence.

Already, though, that void was starting to decay into a world of certainties. He sighed, but he did not stop smiling. It was a rare thing when Niain let go of that smile…

…the curled lips of barely constrained laughter.

“Well then,” he said, as the venue came into existence. “Shall we commence this meeting?”