Euryphel sighed and rubbed his jaw. “We can try it again, but this time I want you to test the city’s southern entrance.”

“It’s almost morning for you,” Ian observed. “I’ve been careful; we should have more time before I’m discovered by anyone. We can resume this later once you’ve taken a break.”

The prince frowned and glanced at his mug of midnight coffee. It was still full, though it had gotten cold over the past hour. The caffeine effect didn’t carry over into the real world after drinking coffee in a Regret scenario, but Euryphel didn’t concern himself with such minor details: Unlimited coffee was unlimited coffee.

“You said that you’re trying to draw out Ventrebel, a suspected necromancer,” Euryphel replied. “Have you tried doing anything special that might attract his attention?”

“...Define, ‘special.’”

Euryphel rolled his eyes. “I’ve seen you perform necromancy before, Ian. Back in the Infinity Loop, for one, when you were dealing with the obfuscation construct. That might be the kind of taboo necessary to draw Ventrebel out of hiding.”

“You make it seem as though you’ve seen me do necromancy outside of the loop.”

Euryphel considered his next words carefully. “I haven’t seen per se, but I’d suspect you might have dabbled based on the gift you received from that ascendant who visited you in a dream, Achemiss...and moreover, based on the fact that you’re here, trying to track down a necromancer. It’s what I’d expect someone to do if they were looking for a teacher.”

Ian was quiet for a few seconds. “I almost forgot that you knew about my enhanced vision. Did I ever clarify–”

“–That you can see souls? Yes. You’ve explained to me in scenarios.”

“I was going to ask if I clarified what I saw in the dream.”

The prince drummed his fingers on the table. “I think you’ve told me everything. Achemiss showed you a vision in which you would lose to Descendant Ari; moreover, the vision indicated that her arrival would herald the shattering of the Selejan continent. Achemiss offered to intervene by stopping Selejo’s shattering and giving you a gift that would help you survive Ari’s onslaught.”

“You forgot to mention that Achemiss wants me to kill Ari,” Ian added.

“I don’t think he’d ask unless he thought you stood a chance of being successful, even if the chance is slim.”

“Regardless, Eury...you’re correct that I’m here to learn more about necromancy. I think it’s the key that will allow me to overcome Ari.”

Euryphel smiled to himself. Ian admitting to pursuing necromancy was a capital offense; to confide in him was a display of trust that caused his heart to quicken.

“All the more reason to test out necromancy in a scenario,” the prince reiterated. “You won’t remember it, but whatever you tell me I can repeat back to you.” The speed at which communication happened over quantum channel wasn’t limited by the physical constraints of speech, allowing for much faster knowledge transfer. Euryphel thought he might go crazy if he actually had to spend a solid minute after every loop conveying what had happened.

“...I suppose it can’t hurt. Nobody will remember besides you.”

The prince ran a hand through a lock of blond hair. “Exactly.”

“Alright. Let me know when we’re in a scenario.”

Euryphel smiled and picked up his cup of coffee, taking a sip. “Fire away.”

“I’m flying toward the southern edge of the city. No bone wyrm.”

Euryphel nodded along as he listened. He’ll be running a few seconds behind without the wyrm.

“I touch down lightly on the roof of the parliament building. Like before, they seem to be reacting a lot more strongly to my presence when I’m not so showy.”

“How so?”

“They barely engage when I come in fully surrounded by the wyrm and a bone shield, wreaking havoc,” Ian explained.

“Gnoste’s Beginning practitioners must realize that they’re in a scenario,” Euryphel noted. “But you make it harder for them when you aren’t so obviously murderous.”

“Me, murderous? Anyways, I cut away a section of the roof and jump downward. I see a bunch of important-looking people in suits and meeting around a circular table. I freeze all of them and...” Ian trailed off.

“And what? You have twenty seconds remaining.”

“I think I’m overthinking this.”

Euryphel rubbed at the bridge of his nose. “Just try something. Anything.”

“I take the one at the head of the table, the one who looks most important, and...well, I try and see if I can separate out his soul while he’s still alive. It’s...he’d be screaming if not for the fact that I’m freezing his mouth shut. My Death energy is piercing through him and encircling his heart, chasing the circuit of vitality through his body.”

“Ten seconds.”

“I have his soul,” Ian replied. “But he’s dead. And I don’t–”

“Ian?”

“Someone’s attacking me,” Ian spat back. “I think they’re trying to do to me...what I did to this man.”

The scenario snapped back to the present. Eury swished his coffee mug on the desk and sighed. “Ian, whatever you just tried, I want you to do it again but act faster. Specifically, you went to the parliament building, broke in through the roof, attacked a bunch of important people in a meeting...and then killed someone, taking their soul.”

“Got it.”

“Just before the scenario ended, you said that someone was attacking you.”

“People tend to do that when I attack them.”

“Not like how you’re thinking. You seemed to suggest the assailant was retaliating with necromancy...doing unto you what you did to the person you killed.”

There was silence for a moment. “That’s an excellent lead,” Ian replied. “I really said that someone was attacking me with necromancy?”

“That’s what I heard.”

“Okay, let me know what I should try again.”

Euryphel lifted the mug to his lips. “Now.”

“I’m doing the same thing I planned in the last scenario...Okay, I’m on the roof. Just carved a hole and I’m dropping down. Doesn’t look like I’m in a meeting room this time; the room’s empty.”

Euryphel scowled. Working with others in Regret loops was always a struggle because of inconsistencies: Tell someone an open-ended instruction and they’d do it a different way each time.

“Couldn’t you just look for a place with the most vital signatures?”

“Now I can,” Ian said. “I couldn’t on the roof because they constructed it out of a dense material that paints everything below black in my vital vision. I’m punching through the wall now...Okay, I see the meeting room folks. What did I say I did before, exactly?”

Euryphel thought back to the previous scenario. Ian hadn’t described what he’d tried in great detail, perhaps because he was uncomfortable describing what he was doing. “You tried to separate out a man’s soul while he was alive. Didn’t seem like you were too successful since he ultimately expired.”

“If that was enough to draw someone’s attention, I’ll try it again. I burst into the room and freeze everyone in place. I walk over to the man at the head of the table and kill him; I see his soul and grab ahold of it. Time?”

“Fifteen seconds. Anything happening?”

“No...not yet. Maybe it was the way I killed him before that drew my assailant’s attention.”

The next few seconds ticked on; a few guards tried to enter the room and engage Ian, but he froze them in short order. The scenario ended, anticlimactically snapping back to the present.

“Go back to the parliament building. We need to break this scenario down to be more efficient.”

“No explanation?”

“The last scenario was a waste,” the prince replied. “And now you’re in a new one. Let me know as soon as you make it to the parliament.”

“Will do. I’m heading over now; I don’t see anyone on my way. Okay, I’m there.”

“What do you see?”

“Very little; the roof obscures vitality signatures.”

Euryphel sighed and took a swig of his coffee. I should really heat this back up. “Ian, can you describe anything on the roof that might serve as a landmark? Something like a heat exhaust vent, glossware, or memorable architectural structures.”

“The rooftop is flat. Where I’m standing, it seems to just be made out of concrete, though if you leave this flat area the roof slopes downward and is covered in gray clay tiles. There’s a single heat exhaust vent off to the side.”

“Excellent. Can you go over to the exhaust vent and start to destroy the roof around it? We need to establish a reference point for what rooms are lying underneath the roof.”

“I’m supposed to be looking for a meeting room with some people in it, right? I found it. It’s just to the right of the exhaust vent.”

Euryphel envisioned Ian coming back in the next scenario...and approaching the roof from the opposite side. “From what perspective?”

“If I’m facing the sun, it’s on the right.”

The prince nodded. “Got it.” Euryphel ended the scenario and started another one up without pause, not bothering to debrief Ian. From the decemancer’s perspective, almost no time would have passed.

Ian continued as before to the parliament building. When he signaled that he’d made it to the roof, Euryphel told him to carve a hole leading down into the meeting room. Rather than questioning why Euryphel suddenly had prescience about the room’s location, Ian followed the prince’s instructions unhesitatingly.

“I’ve frozen everyone here. I’m trying to separate out the man’s soul from his body, though it feels like trying to peel the skin off a grape. Souls are both slippery and deeply embedded; it’s a bit of a paradox. But I think...I might...just...”

“Ian?” He was taking several seconds longer than he had the first time extracting the man’s soul. Euryphel wondered if he’d had a new insight or if he’d just run into trouble.

“I think I did it,” Ian said. “He’s unconscious and I have his soul. Time?”

“Twenty-five seconds. Any sign of the–”

Rather than any words coming over the quantum channel, a stream of what could only be described as soundless gasps of pain came into Euryphel’s mind.

“That’s the necromancer, Ian! This could be Ventrebel! You need to try and trace the source!” He wasn’t sure his encouragement would do much, though it wouldn’t hurt; Euryphel wasn’t sure it would take for Ian to be immobilized by pain, but if a literal shot to the heart didn’t do it...

“Fuck this guy,” Ian replied. “I moved back up through the roof and that shook the attacker’s control, so he’s clearly operating at a limited range. Time?”

Euryphel killed the scenario and immediately hopped to the next. He now had enough information to generally guide Ian into attracting the attention of the necromancer; every time the necromancer attacked, Euryphel instructed Ian to fly off in specific directions to triangulate their location. Eight scenarios later, Euryphel thought he had a good idea where the necromancer was hiding.

“I separated the man’s soul,” Ian exclaimed. “Just waiting for–”

Euryphel recognized the abrupt stop in Ian’s thoughts as a signal that the necromancer started their assault.

“It’s painful, but you can do it. I need you to crash through the wall next to the trash bin. Then I want you to smash through the floor.”

“Done. Fuck, it’s hard to think. I sense some vital signatures in the surrounding rooms. Where should I go?”

“Forward. We’re close.”

“The pain’s getting worse,” Ian replied. “It feels like someone’s burning me alive from the inside. Y’jeni...”

Euryphel’s hands gripped his coffee mug, his knuckles turning white. “Go towards the pain! It’s all just a scenario; it’ll be over in a few seconds.” They were so close.

“I just...I broke down the...the wall...there’s a man looking at me.”

“What does he look like!?”

“He’s too old to be...he’s not...not Ventrebel. I don’t understand how he’s even alive, he’s completely saturated in Death energy. I didn’t even notice him. This isn’t even...”

“Ian, hang on! Ask for his name! Seven seconds!”

“I tell him my name and he just narrows his eyes. But now that I can see him, I try to control the Death energy that’s pervaded his entire body. He staggers but stays upright, which means he must be powerful enough to resist me. Wait, he...he says his name is Soolemar.”

Before Euryphel could ask anything else, the scenario ended.

Euryphel drew his hands to either side of his head and tugged at his hair. This is so much more frustrating when I can’t be there myself. Even so, against the odds, they’d managed to actually get a lead on a necromancer in Gnoste, even if he wasn’t Ventrebel.

Euryphel took a moment to gather his thoughts. “You’ve never heard of a man named Soolemar, have you?”

Ian paused. “I have, actually. Hercates mentioned him in his grimoire, but that doesn’t mean much. Anyone in his grimoire should be long dead.”

Euryphel snorted and leaned back in his chair. “A necromancer who referred to himself as Soolemar is in the parliament building.” Out of habit, he raised an eyebrow even though nobody would see it.

“Huh. Now I’m really curious who this guy is.”

“Ready to go again?” Euryphel asked.

“Ready when you are.”