“You don’t know that!”

“I’m not willing to test it,” Angel hissed. Alison released his hand, but she made no signs of giving up. Blue light continued to trace its way along the room. Over ninety percent of it was covered now, but Alison’s hands were shaking.

“Almost there,” Alison repeated. Magic flared around her once more and the beam’s intensity redoubled.

Angel forced himself to his feet with a groan. The world swam around him, but he maintained his balance. Alison didn’t even glance at him. She took another step forward, forcing more magic into her spell.

Her skin was pale and her breaths came in short gasps. Angel extended a shaking hand and placed it on her shoulder. A burst of pain shot up his fingertips and he yanked it back with a surprised curse. She was burning hot, like metal left out in the Barren’s sun all day.

“Almost,” Alison growled, her fingers shaking with exertion and sweat pouring down her brow. The lines stretched further along the walls, lighting the room completely. They traced across the final portion of the room and connected, illuminating the last of the runes in the two massive doors in the wall. “There.”

The entire room rumbled. Lights flickered and the platforms around them wavered in the air, fighting to remain floating.

Alison crumpled back and Angel barely managed to move himself in time to keep her head from hitting the ground. Now that the magical draw had finally faded, his body was starting to respond to his brain once more.

“Alison?” Angel asked, shaking her slightly. She didn’t respond, but her chest was still rising and falling with weak breath. He gritted his teeth and laid her out as the others started to get back up as well.

“She did it,” Lilian breathed while Tilly and Vanessa scrambled over to check on the other girl.

“Is she going to be okay?” Tilly asked nervously. Jake squawked, mirroring his partner’s feelings.

“I’m not a doctor, but she’s still breathing,” Angel replied, his brow furrowed. “She should be okay, but she won’t be waking up any time soon. We need to watch over her. We can’t drag her into danger unconscious.”

Dust rained down on them and the rumbling intensified. Light lit the edges of the huge doors embedded in the wall, tracing through runes along them.

“We can’t just all wait here. The Vault is opening,” Silver observed.

“I’ll stay with Jake,” Tilly volunteered, swallowing. “I’d probably be the least use out of all of us here anyway.”

“As will I,” Vanessa said.

“What if Soul comes for you?” Lilian asked. “It’s not safe.”

“You’re misunderstanding the reason why they’re staying with Alison,” Angel said grimly. “It’s to take care of her, not protect her. If Soul came for her, there’s nothing any of us could do to stop him. You remember his level, don’t you? We literally cannot fight against him. He’s just been toying with us.”

Tilly swallowed. “That’s really not very reassuring.”

“It’s fine,” Silver said. “Soul is up on the surface somewhere. Just try to stay out of the way. He’s probably already gotten what he needed to from Alison. We’re just ahead of him.”

“That isn’t reassuring either,” Tilly muttered. “May be you guys should just get going before you make this sound any worse.”

“We’ll be fine,” Vanessa said, pressing her lips together. “Find Soul and make him pay.”

Light flooded into the room as the doors ground open, revealing a gold paved pathway behind them. Thick glimmering tubes of silver hung from the ceiling along the path, pulsing with brilliant blue liquid.

Angel swallowed and aimed his newly repaired grappling hook at the top of the doorway. He glanced back at Tilly, who gave him a reassuring nod, and then fired the hook.

Lilian’s wings sprouted from her back and she zipped over to the door while Angel swung through the air, landing beside her.

Silver took a few steps back and charged across the platform, leaping through the air and latching onto the wall. He clambered up it and popped to his feet beside the other two, brushing imaginary dirt from his clothes and adjusting his hat. “Let’s go see just what kind of goodies are stored in here, then.”

Angel nodded and set off down the path, the other two falling in step behind him. The sound of their footfalls echoed through the halls. Angel’s skin prickled with magic, but his Star Fragment remained silent.

The hall came to a stop before a huge, open room. Within it, a massive copper sphere hung suspended in the air. It was the size of a small mansion and covered with machinery and runes. Huge tubes ferried brilliant blue magic around it, traveling down into the walls and floor. Vents puffed thick purple smoke that gathered at the ceiling above.

A lone console sat directly before them. It was amusingly small compared to the majesty of the rest of the room.

Angel took a shaky breath and instantly regretted it. His lungs burned and he staggered back, gasping for air instinctively. His arm sparked and the feeling faded away.

“There’s so much magic,” Angel breathed. “I can literally taste it.”

“What is this place?” Lilian asked, swiping a hand through the air. Tiny motes of blue light flickered across her fingers.

“It kind of tickles,” Silver said. “I’ve never felt so much magic before.”

Angel tapped a foot on the ground, sending a tiny ripple of magic out from the impact point. “This is incredible. And look at those tubes - they’re drawing even more magic into the sphere. With the density of energy in here…”

“It’s like all the magic in the world,” Lilian finished.

“Literally, if Soul is to be believed,” Angel said. He took a hesitant step into the room, breathing in slightly. The magic tickled his lungs, but it wasn’t as bad as the first time. He pressed onward, approaching the console. “This must be where Old world Magic was sealed. But when did they have time to build such a thing during the Great War? The Buried Gods existed long before it. Does that mean someone had planned to seal magic before the war even started?”

Angel arrived before the console and pressed his hand against it. Runes along its sides lit up and a screen flickered to life before him. And, just like that, Angel understood.

System Interface

[Hello, Wonderful. Welcome to Node 01, the central processing unit for the System. What is your query?]

“Oh shit,” Angel muttered. “It’s the System itself. That’s how it’s operating everywhere. It’s using all the magic to run itself. That couldn’t have been intentional, though. The System existed during the Great War, didn’t it?”

“It did,” Lilian confirmed, grimacing as magic slipped between her lips. “But not at the scale it exists at now. There were several, actually. It’s just been so long that I assumed the others had gone defunct, not that one had overpowered them because they simply had no magic left to run.”

“Then someone modified the System to draw far more energy than it was supposed to and somehow made it gather all the Ether in the world?” Silver asked. “So if we blow up this thing, the magic is free?”

“Blowing it up would be bad,” Angel said. “We’d all get obliterated, and there’s so much magic stored here that would be consumed in the reaction - if it goes up, who knows how many years it will be before magic returns to the rest of the world. We need to shut it down, not destroy it.”

“Do you think asking politely will work?” Silver wondered.

Angel shook his arm. “You’ve been pretty quiet. How about some help? You brought us here. Now let’s bring Old World Magic back before Soul shows up.”

The Star Fragment crackled. “So little has changed. It is almost disappointing.”

“What do you mean?” Angel asked. “Were you the one that made this?”

“Some things never change, Angel. You’ve gotten better at traversing catacombs and deconstructing Old World Magic, but a fool you were and a fool you will always be.”