Chương 321: You Were Dead

Working with Fwatta lasted from sunup to seventh bell, we both skipped breakfast. We were both too wired and exhausted to think about food, until eventually we wound down and became aware that we were extremely hungry. I flew down the road to Skydown crossing and stopped at the public-house to eat some oatmeal in the common room.

The counterman was surprised to see me there in town during a schoolday, but I gave him an abbreviated version of events that left out significant things like "I almost died", or "I really should have died". Oatmeal seemed like a gentle and careful meal to try out with my new stomach, I wanted to give it time to adjust before I try anything more exciting than that. Pretty much everything in my abdominal region had either been destroyed outright or ruined so thoroughly as to need to be rebuilt from scratch.

All night I had been terrified to check my status screen. Sure, it probably showed me at 1HP, but... what if it didn't? What if tonight was the night that I finally became a lich in earnest? After all, the first corpse every lich inhabits is their own. If I had actually died, and was just an animated corpse, then Fwatta probably could not have helped me. Healers can't fix dead things. But a recently-deceased animated corpse still attached to its own untethered essence? That's uncharted waters.

We would only be guessing at what is possible and what is not. It may be that I am now actually an undead creature, but one that can be repaired with a healer's magic. I just don't know. My normal hit points these days reads as 24/24. When I'm channeling something tough like thunderbeasts or bamboo, it adds my sorcerous Strength, 35/35 total. Hardened essences can give me an armor rating that subtracts damage taken, such as jade or marble or obsidian, reducing attacks by 11 damage before it hits my HP.

That's how corundum helps. It boosts my Charisma, but also it gives me that defense rating. 24 hit points with 11 points of built-in armor. The steel plates in my bodice probably added a few points as well, which means that I could maybe weather a 35 damage attack, or with the right protection or a lucky random roll, as much as 40 points. I don't know how much damage a diamond-tipped explosion-impalement does, but I doubt that it's exactly 39 points.

But what is definitely true is that sitting alone, exhausted, slowly spooning oatmeal, in the aftermath of everything I just went through, is a terrible time to sit and break down all this introspection. I am trying to mentally calculate the odds that I'm actually alive, or that I'm actually dead but doing a good enough job of faking life that I could even fool myself. People might sometimes say something like "you look haunted", but I don't think it's ever as true as it was for me right then.

I was trying to figure out if I'm a ghost possessing myself or if I'm just a little bit tougher than I thought I was. Being dead would sure explain why I did not pass out even once during that ordeal. My spoon clinked against the clay bowl, I chased around the last few bits of boiled cereal grains with an idle mind and slow-moving hand. I rested the side of my head on my other hand, elbow on the tabletop, trying to convince my pensive body that I am relaxed and thoughtful.

I distracted myself from the horrors of recovery by thinking about the terror of the attack. I had been walking towards the seats to watch the fashion show. Thinking about how boring it would be. And then someone from behind me had stabbed me. The implement had been a wooden stake, like a pool cue or a walking stick. Lots of people there had walking sticks, it was an accessory that was seen quite often in well-heeled environments.

Normally their utility as a weapon is overlooked, even in environments where weapons are forbidden. But that is normally when the danger is in getting walloped by a blunt instrument. I had been stabbed. In that instant I knew that the glittering crystalline point of the weapon had been a diamond. Not only because it had penetrated my corundum defenses, but because it had been utterly blank to my affinities. I have at least a few percentile affinity for most forms of crystal, but none at all for diamond.

So that is how someone brought a stabbing implement within stabbing range of me without me being aware of it- they used a haft that I took for granted and a lethal point that I was blind to. But it doesn't explain why they were able to get a sigil-infused weapon that close to me without me noticing. I pay attention to ink, especially if it's exotic varieties, especially in configurations that don't feel like normal script. I've gotten good at telling the difference.

My weakness is for sigils that are carved and not scribed, since I have to pay a lot more attention to the shapes of everything and not just ink specifically. However, carved sigils are generally more limited, weaker, and harder to create a specialized effect.

I can consult my expert later, but I don't think she's going to tell me it's possible to use only carved sigils to craft a spell that creates a devastating point-blank explosion when it is run through a human body or exposed to blood or whatever the trigger was. So there is still elements here that I'm missing. For damn sure, though, whoever did this knows a lot more about how to kill a sorcerer than most people would guess. Someone who understands my senses and my methods.

That arrow at the beginning was to test my defenses and make sure I haven't changed my system. And also, probably, to make me overconfident. And even after Larianne and Rabert had all but beaten me over the head with warnings, I was still overconfident. They had told me that the next attempt would be made with a stronger weapon. I had not assumed the progression would be from "warning shot" to "overkill". I had really thought there would be more grades of escalation between those.

But then, that would have just given me notice of how much I need to increase my protective detail. Obviously I feel like they should have done that. Obviously they did not. If they had any sense they were hunting me right now, or covering their tracks, or both. Because I was the one who almost died, I'm going to have to assume that my would-be killers have more sense than I do. Since they don't have my corpse, they know I'm still alive.

They've got several hours head start on me, and I am exhausted and still badly beat. Full HP, but my stamina is almost run out and that's a problem that healers can't fix. A few things to take care of first. I stood, paid for the oatmeal. I dispelled the water I had conjured on Sixthday, and then opened a portal to take me back to the Academy. Even though I had just eaten, I still need to finish recharging.

I arrived at the school as the lunch hour was beginning, and I cruised into the dining hall looking for something more substantial for my newly-rebuilt digestive system. I walked right into screaming. I jumped back, already in a panic, and my dull exhausted fugue vanished like glass breaking, suddenly startlingly aware of everything around me. People staring and pointing, all sorts of reactions and expressions. The room was a hubbub, yelling, babbling, trays clattering, benches scooting.

And all eyes were on me, whether they were ecstatic or terrified or boiling with rage or despondent or just blank with total surprise. I tried to take it all in but there was a big smear of open-mouthed faces and noises, all in motion like choppy waters, and I had to blink myself back to full awareness, like my ability to focus had just slid away for a moment. In fact, it took me an extra couple of seconds to realize that anyone was sprinting at me.

I blinked dumbly at the fast-moving figures before they crashed into me. Thumper was first, and her arms took me off my feet before she had even come to a stop, almost more of a tackle than an embrace. Tiviti was an instant behind her, her long-fingered hand pressing across my back. Vancy did not have the athletic training or musculature of those two but she damn near matched them, plowing into my with tears streaming out behind her like a comet's tail.

Tiviti's hand on my back, supporting and bracing me, was the only reason this whole tangle did not collapse onto the floor in an instant.

"Oh my god you were deeeeeaaad," Vancy sobbed.

"I wasn't dead, I promise," I told her. Her breath heaved as she tried to talk, interrupting herself with hiccupping sounds.

"But you- but - but- but you were gone and everyone said- they said -they-" Thumper eased her arms back enough that I could grab Vancy and hold her, convince her with my solidity and warmth.

"Honest. I'm all right. It took hours with a healer but I'm alive."

"Hours?" Thumper repeated, raising an eyebrow.

"Second worst I've ever been hurt," I told her as I rubbed circles on Vancy's shoulder-blades.

"Got no sleep, still exhausted." That was about as much privacy as we got for that discussion, because those three were only the fastest-moving of the people who were interested in getting up close with me. A circular wall of bodies closed around me, and the front row was all familiar faces: Elica, Rabert, Quarl, Ryichsur, Kurumi, Larianne, Kimothy. Belisa appeared next to me, and just behind the front row I could see Liard, Rinnie, and even Gala.

Gala mostly seemed interested in staring at me curiously, but the rest all showed relief and joy to see me. It was really, really gratifying. So of course I had to say the thing.

"Rumors of my demise have been greatly exaggerated." That was one of the best laughs I've ever gotten to a quip, dozens of people roaring with laughter as the tension and surprise grounded itself in a laugh-line. The great thing about being the only representative of an entire culture is that I get to claim all the best jokes as being my own.

"Are you going to try to find them?" Quarl asked quietly from very close by.

"To what end?" I shrugged. And I meant it. Now that I was thinking more sharply, it seemed obvious. The assassins had been sent by some of my enemies. I've got enough: the magisters, human traffickers, rival smugglers, Kralcit, and the royal family, obviously. And whether I hunted down the exact hand that stabbed me, whether I could prove exactly who hired them, would not make a difference. I started gathering people near me in my arms and hugged them back.

I had not realized so many people were worried about me, let along how many were already mourning me. I hugged them hard, and shared the moment, and I let a wash of humanity bear me along for the rest of the lunch period.

"So the reason everyone thought you were dead," Kimothy started off, "was because everyone saw you die. I mean, that's my understanding. I wasn't there but it's basically the only thing anyone is talking about all day. You laughed off one assassin, but the next one stabbed you all the way through and then exploded half the room, and then they saw your soul ascend right before your body disintegrated, leaving behind about a bathtub's worth of blood on the ground in the shape of your body. It was pretty convincing."

"So, the very conclusive evidence of my demise was greatly exaggerated," I amended my earlier statement. We were leaning against the wall next to the firing lanes. Sorcery is my class right after lunch, so this is my first chance to get a one-on-one and really talk through the rumors left behind from last night. Most of the class was still staring at me like I was some kind of spooky ghast that was going to rattle some chains and vanish into thin air.

To be fair, I am spooky and I disappear into thin air rather frequently.

"Now, you have to tell me how you actually aren't dead," he said.

"I regret this story is going to be so much less amazing than yours," I said.

"First, it wasn't my heart, it was my stomach. Second, only part of the explosion was from the assassin, most of the people getting blasted back was because of me, pushing people away just in case there was another attacker. While everyone was sorting themselves out, I stuffed the wound and sealed it to slow the bleeding as much as possible. Then I floated up to get a look around, and then teleported to a healer that I know who has fixed me from even worse injuries than this."

"... but not a necromancer?" he asked. Why does everyone need to bring up that same question?

"No, she's a genuine miracle worker, but not a resurrectionist," I assured him.

"The real answer to your question is threefold: the attack was a lot less lethal than people have been saying, and I am a hell of a lot tougher than anyone has any human right to be, and I got quality medical care extremely quickly."

"I suppose that makes sense than your body disintegrating. Even for you, that was a rather fanciful detail."

"You say that," I sighed, "but now I'm left wondering if that actually would happen to me. My body is infused with void essence that is held in check but is never fully dissipated. I nearly disintegrated once before, that's why my color never came back. It actually is possible than when my own essence does leave this body, there will be nothing stopping it from just unraveling into nothingness." I paused, shuddered.

"Probably not. But maybe. And I'll never know, really."

"And all the blood?"

"It was a lot, yeah," I admitted.

"I got control fairly quickly, but a hole that big loses blood fast." And now his expression was of that morbid horrified fascination.

"So, how big a hole really? Some rumor was going around that Lady Brickwich looked straight through your body and saw a whole candle from bottom to top through the hole."

"With the right angle, maybe, yeah," I admitted.

"Explosions inside the body do a lot of damage." More morbid, more horrified, more fascinated.

"So it's true? All the way through you?!"

"Fwatta told me she could have put her arm through and not touched the sides."

"And you lived through that," he said, with skeptical doubt.

"It was really close!" I said in my defense because I'm not an undead monster.

"Now then, Kimothy, I've got a question. It's not about necromancy."

"You said that just before I started to wonder."

"How would you make a sigil to explode on contact with blood, without using any ink?"

"Making sigils explode is fairly easy. There's a variety of ways to get them to just fill up a bunch of energy without giving them a purpose or outlet. And then when the sigil breaks, it goes boom. It's pretty much every scrivener's first diary-protection plan, elementary stuff. Dangerous, but simple, and very inelegant. But using a keyed trigger? A contact or conditional trigger? Something safe to walk around with that will only go off exactly when you want it to?"

"That's the question, yes," I said. He let that moment stretch out a little.

"Hmm. Well, the short and simple technical answer is that it can't be done. Getting anything other than the very basics into a spell is going to take some ink. And anything as complex as a specific trigger will take some doing. You would need precision work, and anything with inkless sigils is going to be a kludge."

"Can't be done?"

"Unless they used something that you can't sense," he said.

"Something like diamond," I said, nodding.

"Because you can't sense diamonds," he said. He was thoughtful. He was going somewhere with this.

"Right."

"Nobody can," he said.

"No sorcerer ever could, because diamond never gives up its affinity." The gears were turning, his train of thought was running fast.

"Right," I repeated. I was not sure where he was going with this but I was ready to trust the process.

"You know, I've only been a sorcerer for a short time," Kimothy mentioned off-handedly, casually, airy and unconcerned all of the sudden.

"Before that I hung in scrivening circles. And most mages outside of sorcery take it as a point of pride not to know much about sorcery. It's beneath them."

"So the only person who would know to use a diamond-tipped walking stick, would be another sorcerer," I finished his thought.

"A carved sigil could never explode a wooden implement lodged in you by itself," he said.

"But any sorcerer with that affinity would be able." That's another part of the mystery solved. So someone wanted to frame the magisters for my murder. Fine, I'll work that out later. But at least I'm pretty sure I figured out who gave the order. There is someone I know who is particularly fond of sending a sorcerer to deal with a sorcerer. Grade Kralcit has put herself back at the top of my list.