Chapter 281: Hello (Patreon)

“Ah, yes,” Suri chimes. “I took the liberty of entering your friend’s Core to remove Farouq’s Commands. I hope you don’t mind.”

I shake my head, lost for words.

“Hey Nonya,” Alec says with a hoarse chuckle. “Long time no see. I would hug you, but, well, I already tried that with Kaitlynn, and nearly ran into a wall, so...”

I laugh wetly. “It’s good to see you, too, Alec. And you’ll get to give me that hug soon, I promise.”

In spirit, at least.

“I’m sure you’re still busy right now, but I just wanted to say... thank you, for not giving up,” he adds. “I’ve only heard the barest description of what you’ve all been through, but it already sounded bonkers.”

I shake my head. “Couldn’t have done it without you. Without your sacrifice.”

He smiles, scratching his neck. “Well... clearly I made the right choice, letting you have that door, so I’ve got no complaints.”

“If you’re quite done patting each other on the back,” Suri chimes dryly. “Can we get a move on, please? Still holding open a pocket dimension here.”

“Actually, can I... see him?” Alec asks hesitantly. “Before you take him off to La La Land?”

“That’s not... what’s it called, but sure,” I reply, before nodding at Suri. “You can release him, he’s not going anywhere.”

In response, she lets out a contented chime and sets about carefully dispersing the pocket dimension. The tiny blue ball grows until it takes up as much space as what’s inside it, before it finally pops like a bubble, revealing a floating purple crystal.

Farouq hangs there quietly, but then, I’ve Commanded him not to speak unless spoken to.

We made a list of simple Commands to keep a prisoner under control for a short time, and this is one of them.

It’s possible to make a more general Command, of course, something like ‘don’t do anything unless I tell you to,’ but that’s putting all your eggs in one basket.

Adding together multiple Commands to cover different areas makes for a stronger binding overall, and provides more information to boot. For example, I can tell he’s not straining much against my Command not to go anywhere without my permission, but he definitely wants to say things.

Well, sucks to be him, for a change.

“Hey Farouq,” Alec says after a moment. “Guess I was right after all, huh? They did come for me.”

“Seems that way,” Farouq chimes in reply, as he’s now allowed to respond. “You have some impressive friends.”

The way he says it almost sounds kinda melancholy.

Alec nods. “You know what this means, right?” he asks, before breaking out into a grin. “Next project, we’re doing things my way.”

I blink. Doesn’t seem like Alec has too bad a relationship with Farouq...

Well, good for him, I guess.

Farouq is quiet for a moment. “I’m not sure there is going to be another project, but if there is, I suppose we will.”

He goes silent again, and after a moment, I clear my throat and clap my hands together. “All right, Farouq. First, we’re going to need you to get your affairs in order, cancel any appointments for the immediate future, because your body is going to make an extended stay here, while your spirit... is going on a little trip.”

After we get Farouq’s spirit all squared away in Herman’s Haven, we return to the Yin-Yang Realm via our new mortal tethers, and find Alec and the Hoig gathered in Loudmouth’s little cabin on his private lake.

For some reason, the decorations and furniture here are a lot less garish than in his dressing room; it has a lot of wood and earthy tones, giving it more of a rustic feel.

There may be hope for Loudmouth yet.

Alec and Loudmouth are chatting up a storm when we arrive, evidently quite happy to be reunited. Our arrival is met with happy cheers from the four fleshlings, and we take a bit to settle in and reconnect.

Kaitlynn and I take turns telling him about our various adventures in Spiritual Realmspace, and he listens to most of it wide-eyed.

He, in turn, relates about his life as Farouq’s host.

For most Flawed-tier Peilor, buying a host off a popular show would be far beyond their means. Lyrack, for example, was only barely able to afford Loudmouth—who wasn’t even one of the shiny new humans—yet Farouq had seemingly purchased Alec without digging too deep in his pockets, which just goes to show that he really does have a bit of a weird status in Peilor society.

Apparently, Farouq had been interested in humans for a while, due to their manual dexterity, but it was Alec’s artistic sense that pushed him over the edge to make a bid.

Consequently, he was quite pleased with his purchase, and treated Alec fairly well. Rather than just using him as a pair of hands to help create his art—something Farouq was apparently quite capable of doing himself, through Lavi manipulation—he used Alec as a sounding board and even had the blonde boy make some art of his own, under his supervision.

While this is two for two for Peilor not being the horrible masters I expected, I’m under no delusion that this will hold true for all human hosts.

Also, according to Alec, it wasn’t all great.

“Oh god, what was that stuff even that I ate?” Alec exclaims at a certain point. “I just remember thinking it was great, but in hindsight, it was like this horrible, pink sludge, and the texture...”

He almost starts dry-heaving, and while I sympathise, I still have to raise a hand to my mouth to cover my smile at his antics.

Loudmouth pats him on the back with a big webbed hand, with a little more force than looks comfortable. “There there, Friend Alec. No worries; Lyrack store many delicious foods for Loudmouth and companions. Plus, lake has fish! Ooh, maybe Friend Alec can make fantastic fish stew...”

Some drool starts to escape from the corner of Loudmouth’s broad mouth at the end of that sentence, betraying his self-interest, but Alec still perks up a little. “That’s a great idea, Loudmouth; I’m actually getting a little hungry.”

Right, I guess they actually need to eat and stuff... Weird.

“Could I have everyone’s attention, please?” Suri chimes at that moment, sounding like she’s about to give a presentation.

Stifling a smile, I hover my spiritform down onto a comfortable-looking brown leather couch, quickly followed by Kaitlynn.

I can’t actually deform the piece of furniture enough to know what sitting on it for real would be like, but I at least get a sense for its texture, which is quite soft and nice.

“Now, before people run off to take care of various needs,” she chimes disdainfully, “I’d like to move on to more pressing matters. First, to bring those who remained behind up to speed: our initial interrogation of Farouq turned out quite fruitful. He was able to reveal to us the respective owners of both Jacob and Dave.”

“Ah, sugar!” Loudmouth exclaims, upon which Alec bursts into laughter.

I blink at them.

“He means sweet,” Alec says by way of explanation. “I was teaching them slang earlier, it’s—never mind. That’s great news!”

“Yah, that really sugary,” Bulging-Eyes croaks. “Soon all of Loudmouth’s Friends back together!”

Smooth-Cheeks wiggles his... well, the lobes of fat over his eyes, suggestively. “Should celebrate when all gathered...”

A muscle next to my eye twitches at the meaning conveyed by his wobbling forehead.

Kaitlynn goes wide-eyed, and Alec and Loudmouth absolutely lose it.

“Ah, Friends not... not that kind of Friends,” Loudmouth manages to croak.

Bulging-Eyes and Smooth-Cheeks share a glance, then shrug, not seeming terribly concerned about that news.

“Anyway,” Suri chimes, clearly unamused. “While we know who has them now, it’s not all good news. It turns out that Pseudo—the Peilor who apparently still owns Jacob—is actually a Pellucid-tier blood sports fanatic called Sudo, who uses him to battle in the arena.”

“Wait, so her name actually sounds the same, it just has a different... spelling?” Kaitlynn asks after a moment, sounding as confused as I feel.

“A different meaning,” Suri corrects. “Spelling isn’t really a thing in this Realm, that’s just how your mind translates it.”

This is making my head hurt, so I resolve to stop thinking about it. “Dave is somehow an even bigger issue, unfortunately,” I continue, taking over. “As Rose apparently managed to sell him to Yog, a Peilor of the Lustrous tier, who you may remember from his absolutely batshit crazy host, the late DJ Avalan.”

“Okay, so who are we going after first?” Alec asks eagerly.

It’s silent for a moment, as that’s not something we’ve discussed yet.

“Well,” Suri chimes. “The way I see it, Dave would be of greater assistance when it comes to your hope of saving Earth. On the other hand, Yog is an old monster, and Lustrous-tier Peilor are all under a great amount of scrutiny, so our chances of success there are relatively slim, and the risks quite great.”

I purse my lips. “Yeah, I hate to say it, but I feel like Dave is out of our reach for the time being; unless we can come up with a really kick-ass plan to get him.”

“Okay, so Jacob first then,” Kaitlynn states firmly, ever the optimist.

“Then what are we going to do?” Alec asks with a frown. “Can we just... invite Sudo over, like you did with Farouq?”

“Not for a simple social call, at least,” I reply. “Neither Lyrack nor Farouq were very well acquainted with Sudo, and inviting her out of the blue is probably not going to go over well. However, I do have an idea of how we may get her... attention.”

I turn my gaze to Alec as I say this, my Imaginary eyes giving him a once-over as I appraise him.

Alec cringes a little under my scrutiny. “Why do I suddenly feel like I’m not going to like this idea?”

I grin at him. “Because you’re not.”

The plan is simple.

Pretending to be Farouq, I’m going to challenge Pseudo—or Sudo, I guess—to a private match.

One without spectators, for obvious reasons.

Now, Farouq is known as an artist, not a fighter, so at first glance this might seem a bit suspicious, but Suri assures we can make it work, with the right framing. After all, Peilor live long lives, and they often get bored. And if one’s thinking of branching out to another field, they’re gonna practice on their own first, not directly in front of a crowd. Maybe get some tips from an expert...

A little flattery never hurts.

So we’re going to invite Sudo to a sparring match, naturally hosted by Farouq’s good friend Lyrack.

And the kicker, the way we hook her, is by baiting her with it being a match between Jacob and Alec, two of the famous Blue Dragons.

And of course, during this ‘friendly spar,’ we’re going to turn the tables and take her down for real.

Or try, at the very least.

It might not be the most well-thought-out plan we’ve produced to date, but we’re running out of time.

Honestly, one of the biggest risks might be that someone could notice that we’re gathering the Blue Dragons here before we’re done.

If we can at least hold out until we’ve got all of them, however, we can always still take them out of Peilinor and hide them away. Heck, we could even just stick their bodies in some Boreum, get them to cut their spirits loose and permanently station them in the Realm of Imagination, if it comes to that.

It would be preferable, however—or at the very least less suspicious—if we could catch Sudo and Yog alive, have Goddess put all our captured Peilor under some powerful Commands, and have them return to their lives. At least until we’ve figured out a way to save Earth.

But that’s for after we succeed in rescuing them. The best way to minimise the risk of getting caught in the meantime, is to move fast.

And so, I’ve cut my connection with my previous crystal and taken over Farouq’s instead, which is surprisingly comfortable.

It’s probably because he dyed his crystal with Toxic Energy, something he apparently uses a lot in his paintings.

After practising my impersonation of him for a bit—it doesn’t need to be perfect, as Farouq told us Sudo and he have never met in person—Suri leads in the call via the mansion’s Espir system.

It takes a nerve-wracking amount of time before the ringing ends, and a translucent conjuration of Jacob with a pitch-black crystal in his forehead appears before me—similar to the one of me and Alec projected on the other side, no doubt.

It takes me a moment to recognise Jacob, as Sudo has him decked out in something that almost looks like assassin’s gear, a black hood drawn over his head, with bulges that suggest a very different set of horns from the trio that used to adorn his forehead.

Only when he lifts his head out of the shadows a little can I really tell that his skin is an even darker shade of grey now, and his eyes are bloodred for some reason. He also sports a variety of additional piercings across his face, all painted a matte black.

At least his arm has been regrown, so he no longer has to wear that creepy chitinous prosthetic limb.

It’s not just Jacob that looks different, however, as I’m quite sure Sudo—who’s lodged in his forehead now—used to be bright yellow, kinda like Lyrack. For a brief moment, I have the irrational fear that we’ve somehow called the wrong number.

Then I realise I don’t really give a shit what Peilor I’ve got on the line, as long as they have Jacob.

It’s not exactly out of the realm of possibilities for paranoid Pseudo-Sudo to have changed her colour, either.

“Yes?” the Peilor presumed to be Sudo chimes in a gravelly, half-whispered voice.

Well, here goes nothing.

I take a deep breath, and start talking.

Against my wildest expectations, Sudo turns out to be quite reasonable.

Her main demand is that we make a recording of the fight, suggesting we can save it for when and if ‘Farouq’ actually debuts as a fighter, and that we can get a good edit done so he won’t come out looking stupid.

We’d hoped to get her over here with Jacob soon, but her schedule is apparently quite packed. Still, after a bit of hemming and hawing, she finally agrees to swing by in two days.

As the call ends, I mentally sag in relief.

“Two days,” Kaitlynn says wistfully from the side. “That’s not so bad, right?”

“Actually, I think it’s quite perfect,” Suri chimes.

I pop my spiritform out of my new, deep-purple crystal, and raise a brow at her. “And why’s that?”

“Because Alec and you still need to learn to fight together,” comes the smug reply.

Author's note:

Slowly but surely, the gang is getting back together. :)

Who are you looking forward most to seeing again? (Or was it Loudmouth? ;) )

Anyway, thanks for reading!