The addition of the Fallen Kingdom as their secondary didn’t seem to make a great difference at first. Physically, all that changed was the emergence of a massive secondary dome to the temple Nic had built to house his best warriors and most precious treasures.

But when he returned to the sunny floating plaza at the center of the city, whisked back as the illusory decision space ended, Nic saw that there was a beam of purest sunlight that descended through the sky. Children were pointing in wonder. It carved straight down to strike the top of that new dome, shining on the glass panes.

Nic grinned.

It seemed their new resident was settling in.

Waving off some of the more enthusiastic attempts to get his attention, Nic entered the palace, which was still empty except for the stomping stone footsteps of his golems. Winding his way up the stairs, he entered into the space below the new addition…

It was a massive open workshop.

A brass furnace in the shape of a massive human face stood empty, forge and tools beside. A grinding set of clockwork machines powered by a strange solar windmill made of glass and crystal stood nearby, while further on there was a workbench of scattered tools. Over everything the shadows of planets drifted, carried by a set of massive brass rings suspended from the ceiling in a model of a foreign solar system. Each planet was a glass dome, full of flowers and green stalks of grass, containing a sealed ecosystem.

“Ah. The young master arrives…” A voice like thunderous bells pealed out. Nic turned and saw his new craftsman leaning over a central dias, a single pen held delicately in an enormous hand.

The creature was made out of yellow, sunbright crystals, pieced together in geometric faces like a rough gemstone. Actually, he looked at least a little bit like a stained glass window. “I’m glad to make your acquaintance, but also, I am terribly busy. Yes, gods, I am busy at last…” His physical form was that of a centaur being with a lion’s head.

“There’s a sense of time, you know. For thousands of years you feel nothing. But then your mind adjusts to thinking a single sensation each decade, and you begin to piece together whole thoughts, and then, gods help you, you understand your situation. Drifting and idle forever. Until somebody chooses to take a chance on you…”

Nic cleared his throat. “Yeah, yeah that sounds about right. So you were conscious all that time?”

“Half. Half was enough.” The golem finally lifted its pen. “But in that time I had a few ideas for how to improve my runework, and then the itch really started. Every few centuries I’d have the same urgent fear that I’d forget before I was freed. Lucky… I did not…

“Come here. Look.”

Nic approached.

The dias was a single piece of square stone. Perfectly square. Nic would have bet his right arm on the dimensions of the dias being not a micron less than perfect.

Over every inch of the dull gray stone were living, brilliant runes. They wove together like waves, like the rippling tongues of a fire, and covered the stone in ever-shifting patterns. The golem turned. It watched Nic as he observed the runes in turn, kneeling down to follow a single character as it moved through the river of tightly-packed script, transforming as it collided with smaller letters.

“Holy shit…” He breathed out.

“Holy indeed. We are defining the parameters of a god, boy.” The golem shifted away, moving through the broad and sunny space of its workshop. Nic hung on a minute longer, trying to gain some insight from the impossibly dense runes, before his attention snapped back to the matter at hand.

“Defining a god? Sorry, what does that mean?”

“It means, if you could accurately describe every moral dilemma, every issue a soul might face, and the most proper answer… If you could write a book of perfect morality… You could uncover the true face of Righteousness.”

“Is that…” Nic hazarded a guess. “A Concept?”

The golem grunted. “I guess you could call it one, but it’s hardly so limited. If it was a Concept it would be one with the power to shake the foundations of heaven.”

Nic ran his tongue along his lips, almost turning back to the runes. So it was an attempt to create a Concept via pure language, simply by fully describing what that Concept was. The strange thing was, Nic knew that was possible, in fact, he had the evidence written on his skin.

“I’ve seen something like that.” He admitted.

“Yes, I saw those Dao Markings on you. A lucky encounter that left you open to the will of the heavens. We will get along, boy.”

Nic wasn’t so sure. The golem clearly didn’t care much for ceremony or preaching, which Nic had been afraid of, so the only question was…

Would it follow orders?

It really hadn’t offered any kind of loyalty or service.

He turned and looked round the workshop again. Besides the machinery, there were columns of huge, jagged crystal, the same color as the golem himself. Someone had taken a chisel to them, working out the details of bodies from the faceless stone; all of the statues were half-formed.

“What are those?”

“Those? The Unshaped. Each one is a larval thought, waiting to be hatched. When inspiration strikes and I know what they should be, I will carve them with that shape, that purpose, and they will be like me: a Solarus.”

Nic nodded slowly. Golem-eggs.

Well, enough dancing around the matter...

“I’ve got work for you. I need you to build some formations, preferably ones that will help defend the Settlement.” Nic said bluntly.

“Hmmph.” The golem glanced back at him. “You don’t want me building them, I’ll tell you that. I’m a perfectionist. What you want is sloppy work thrown up in a day- what I do is build things that will last for centuries.”

“Besides. Formation-work takes resources, ones you don’t have. All you’ve done is set up a few arrays of marking stones to guide the natural flow of energy in a given direction. Real work- real power- comes when you can draw from the stars above.”

Nic sighed silently. It looked like this was going to be trouble after all. “What kind of resources would you need, to build me an array like that?”

“Shards of starstone. Deepfathoms Puregold. Spiritual stones of any variety, but all of the highest grade and in great quantities. A spirit to bind to the foundation of the array. Dragon blood to write the runes in. Meteoric brass to fix the outer edges of the array…” The golem grunted again. “I could go on. In truth, these are the most basic requirements.”

“Right, so you’re telling me to go fuck myself. Okay.” Nic smiled in his ever-so-dangerous way. “You know, I know you’ve been restricted. You’re not whatever badass you used to be.”

“Oh? You think you can settle this with violence, boy?” The golem half-turned, lifting a hammer from its workbench.

“I think if I have to kick you out of my city, I will. And I’ll keep your fancy god-rock.” Nic said back, planting his feet. “That’s your choice. You can work, or you can leave.”

“Hmm. And what do you expect me to do, with no materials? Shall I conjure matter from thin air?” The golem lifted his hands, as if expecting precious gems to rain from the heavens.

“Just tell me what it is you’re angling for, and skip the bullshit.”

“Simple. A mine for spiritual stones, a trio of apprentices who have grasped the beginnings of a suitable Concept, and fifty thousand First Wave Credits.”

Nic snorted. “A unicorn too? I can throw one in. You can pick any number of apprentices who will put up with your attitude, and as many credits as you can earn. I’ll pay…”

“A thousand is more than reasonable.” Sofia whispered.

“A thousand per formation you set up.”

“I’d sooner chisel my own eyes out.” The golem declared, but before he could continue, Nic cut in.

“I’ll lend you the chisel. Here, final offer.” He brought out half of the divine bones Sula had gifted him, and the brilliant sapphire he’d retrieved from his journey. “You can build whatever you want with these.”

The golem finally drew closer, holding up a massive femur to examine faint wavering lines that traveled across the white. “Hmm. Not very good quality at all, but… It has a sanctified air…”

“But.” Nic retrieved the cherry-red cowboy boots that had given Baby Boots his name. “You have to take the runes out of these and put them into something I can use.”

“Hmmph. Child’s play.”

“So it shouldn’t be a problem then, should it? I’m going to leave now. Have something to show me when I come back.” Turning, Nic departed, not wanting to give the golem a chance to shake him down any further.

As far as Nic was concerned? All that talk of holy purpose was just so much empty air. The golem’s real love was clearly for precious things, not maybe to own them, but to work with them, to see what he could bring out from treasured materials and ancient metals.

---

Nic had a final destination in mind for the day. Deep in the forest, beyond the pines and the croaking, marshy lakes, there was a point where the earth became treacherous, hidden pitfalls covered up by carpets of mossy algae.

In the center of that territory were the mud pits. Huge bubbling craters where soft grey mud churned under the volcanic forces below. Even from a distance, the rising heat and humidity were comforting against his skin.

The axolotl-folk must have lived like this, among heated waters and soft, comfortable mud.

As he approached there was a shifting shadow in the trees, which quickly emerged into a toad-man. Unlike the massive Talnu’Mo this one was long and slender bodied, with sharp horns that crested around his eyes and nose, and drab, almost yellowing skin.

Nic lifted a hand and waved.

“Brother newt.” The creature bowed respectfully. It was dressed in a simple loincloth of beaded, patterned cloth, but the colors were rich enough to speak of some kind of wealth or position in life. “You have come for the gifts of the earth, no?”

Nic nodded. “I have something clogging my meridians. I thought maybe you could help?”

“Brother newt, I am Halsa’Kar. I am the druid of these lands, and I can indeed assist with this.” The creature’s manner was so calm it had the opposite effect on Nic. Something about the quiet good manners just made him wonder what the catch was, or if the creature was hiding something.

“Druid? Sorry, what does a druid do?”

“Tend to the earth. Clear away life that does not serve the greater purpose. For instance, a tree grows along the leyline, but grows greedily. It drinks too much. I would cut it down. If in another place the web of roots fails and there is no life to carry the energies of the earth, I would plant sacred grasses…”

“You garden?”

“I garden. But with a certain amount of sacred history and nude chanting.”

“Riiiight…” Nic stared down into the pit of boiling mud. “How safe is this?”

“Oh, the mud will eat your bones from your flesh, unless…” Reaching down to a bag at its side, the toad-man brought out a small round root and tossed it towards Nic. “You have the proper medicine”

“Right…”

“Your affliction is deep. Ash, yes?”

Nic glanced up, surprised, but then nodded.

“It is not the poison you imagine, brother newt. Rather, it is suffering expunged from your soul. When it is gone you will be better than before…”

That made sense. Nic had wondered why the scroll had inflicted such backlash. Obviously it was heretical, but even heretics weren’t keen on destroying their cultivation. If anything they were the last people who’d sacrifice their own future.

“Eat the medicine. Sink into the earth. Let yourself become whole…”

Nic popped the root into his mouth, chewing through a bitter fennel-seed taste until he felt the medicinal strength circulating through his body. With one cautious step, he pushed a foot down into the pool of mud, and when that failed to burn him to nothing he continued to descend…