Serenity read through the rest of the thesis, but the opening section really covered most of the information in it. There were a number more references and quite a few quotes from the three scrolls that seemed to supply most of the relevant information, but there was only one thing that made Serenity curious, right at the end. The last three words in the thesis seemed completely unconnected to anything.

Incarnate of Knowledge.

Serenity could think of one very good reason for someone to research Incarnates. A large library also seemed like a good place to do the research, especially for an Incarnate of Knowledge. It made Serenity wonder a bit about the fact that the research was never completed; had the Incarnate simply decided not to for some reason or were they interrupted? For that matter, was it even the thesis he’d assumed it to be? This wasn’t a school.

Neither Honoria nor the Library knew where the papers came from. They weren’t even in the catalog. That was strange, since Serenity could have sworn he’d found them using the catalog. Even stranger, the scrolls were listed in the catalog, but they were noted as “missing, location unknown”.

They had to have been deliberately hidden. Serenity didn’t know if he was able to find them because he was a Hand or because he was an Incarnate himself, but either way the idea of hidden knowledge reminded him of the Broken Mirror in the basement. Incarnates weren’t its specialty, but maybe it knew something?

Serenity’s luck wasn’t that good. The Broken Mirror admitted that one of the other Mirrors probably had the information Serenity was looking for, but it had never been included in this one unless it was in the scrambled information. Either way, it wasn’t there. All it was able to do was confirm that “Entities” were important to the Order by showing Serenity an old decree.

An amendment defining the composition of the Council of the Order.

Seeing as the Order is designed to serve all Beings, with the Understanding that the Head of the Order shall always be an Entity to provide a steady Purpose, and in Recognition of the preponderance of non-Entities among the general population of Beings, it is enacted that both Entities and non-Entities are required for the Council to be valid.

Of the permanent Council, Entities must comprise at least a quarter of all Seats. Non-Entities must comprise at least four in ten. The remaining seats may be held by Entities or Non-Entities, but an imbalance must be corrected before any business other than the Admission of New Councilors or Resignation of Existing Councilors may Proceed.

The size of the permanent Council is not fixed but may never fall below four members for actions other than the Admission of New Councilors to be valid.

A meeting of the Council shall require more than three-quarters of the permanent Councilors present to be valid.

Attempts to prevent the Attendance of another Councilor at a Meeting shall be cause for Removal from the Council. Delaying or otherwise attempting to have the Notice of the Meeting arrive with insufficient time to allow the Councilor to attend qualify as such an Attempt.

Refusal to attend meetings shall not result in Removal from the Council until after the fourth such meeting.

For any Meeting to be valid, at least one-quarter of all participants must be Entities and at least one quarter must be non-Entities.

These Rules shall be enacted beginning with the Meeting following the Meeting of their approval.

By general acclaim on this day, 57 Marcet 86254, Fifth Council Meeting during the Reign of the Seventh Star Sovereign

Serenity had the feeling that some of the members of the Council of the Order were willing to engage in some very underhanded politics, back in the day. The rule changes certainly seemed to indicate that, at least.

Serenity had absolutely no idea what the date system meant. He’d never heard of a Seventh Star Sovereign and if “Marcet” was a month, he’d never heard of it either. It wasn’t really all that surprising; the Broken Mirror predated the original near-destruction of Earth’s World Core and the creation of the Voice; that meant it was so far back in the mists of history that there was no reason he should expect to have heard of them.

All he’d really learned was that the Order either didn’t consider “Entities” or “Incarnates” to be included in the category “creatures” or didn’t study how they interacted with magic. Serenity suspected it was a combination of Entities not really being creatures in the normal sense, Incarnates being rare, and both being powerful enough and unique enough that studying them by doing anything other than simply observing was at best difficult.

On the other hand, that did bring up something Serenity had meant to ask about but forgotten the few times he’d been back down to the Broken Mirror over the past few days. “Creatures and how they interact with magic” had to mean monsters, didn’t it? He’d never really paid too much attention to monsters beyond how to kill them, but he was developing an interest in Evolution and what it meant, these days.

He knew some of what Aki thought about dungeon monsters, and he knew what he’d learned over an entirely too long time as Vengeance, then the Final Reaper, before all of the dungeons vanished. He still didn’t know why they vanished, but he suspected it had something to do with the extinction of all life from the worlds they supported. That felt all too consistent with what he’d learned as Serenity. He’d probably killed the worlds themselves, as well.

That was enough of such gloomy thoughts! He hadn’t known about the side effects then; he did now and would never do that again. Finding out what the Broken Mirror knew was far more important.

Serenity really wanted to ask about himself, but strongly doubted there was anything about someone like him; after all, there were no records on Incarnates. The place to start was probably dungeon monsters. That seemed to be the closest category; Serenity did have some rather strong links to dungeons, after all. “Mirror? Do you have an overview of dungeon monster evolution in your archives?”

“No. There is an entire set of resources on monster evolution, including both natural essence and mana overexposure, forced undirected evolution, and forced directed evolution. Please specify a better subcategory than dungeon so that I can determine which series will best fit your request.” The Mirror’s voice sounded slightly chiding, but Serenity didn’t see where he’d said something wrong.

“I mean dungeon monsters. They’re not the same as other monsters; they’re developed by dungeons and formed of mana. Probably both mana and essence, actually. They have to work differently from outside monsters or they wouldn’t repeat so accurately on different runs.” Serenity frowned and looked around the comfortable study room that formed the main area of the Broken Mirror. “They’re also bound to a dungeon; if they become free, they start to act more like outside monsters, though that can take time.”

“Please define dungeon,” the Mirror responded. “The word is unknown.”

Serenity blinked. Dungeon was a standard word in Bridge; it was the same word for the entire time Vengeance spoke the language. Why wouldn’t a repository of knowledge know the word? He’d just have to define it as best he could. “Monster holes. Places, usually on a ley line nexus, where a Core Crystal is found but instead of developing into a City Core or something like the Library, they become a place where monsters form. They’re often mazes, sometimes trapped; the World Core uses them to help regulate mana and essence flows. People go in them to fight and claim rewards or simply to gather the resources they produce.”

Even gathering resources often meant fighting, but there were some dungeons where that wasn’t true. Serenity was reminded of the Settlement Dungeons of Serenity Settlement when he thought of that; they had monsters, but they didn’t make you fight them if you belonged to the Settlement.

“Ah!” The Broken Mirror sounded pleased. “I’ve found a match! That sounds like the improved meditation cavern project proposed by the Lord of Monsters. Data on that project appears to have ceased approximately twenty-five million years ago; if you have more recent data, it would be appreciated. I had assumed it was canceled when no additional data was forthcoming.”

“Improved meditation cavern project?” Somehow, the juxtaposition of that phrase with the information that it was about dungeons gave Serenity a bad feeling, especially with the sponsorship of the Lord of Monsters. Serenity had never heard of … no, that wasn’t true. He’d only ever heard legends of a Lord of Monsters. He’d simply ignored them because they never seemed relevant. No god ever stepped up and tried to stop people from killing monsters, after all. He’d always assumed they were simply people inventing a deity. That happened all the time, after all.

“Yes,” the Broken Mirror responded. “The project had two official goals. The primary goal was a reduction in the requirements for higher-Tier advancement, permitting passive activity to replace active meditation and the potentially dangerous practice of directed internal essence circulation. It was believed that exercise offered the best balance of openness and potential for energy exchange; however, that meant that the energy exchange had to be mediated by a source other than the individual involved. A specialized mediator was needed. A Crystal Core was proposed to be a locational mediator, placed at a nexus for optimal energy density availability.”

Serenity shook his head. He wasn’t sure about the details of what the Broken Mirror was talking about, but it was certainly true that rising in Tier was easier if you spent more time in dungeons. That was standardly attributed to the fact that combat pushed Paths forward and opened new options as you strove to succeed, but it was true even for non-combat Paths.

“The second official goal was the continuation of another project that promised to improve the energy flow and balance of a planet by creating a network of subsidiary nodes. The initial project created City Cores and other specialized nodes like the Library; however, these subsidiary nodes served only as circulation points; they did not increase the speed of reinvestment of Affinity-tainted mana and essence. The improved meditation cavern project promised exactly that, as the mana flowing from deep in the cave system would create a suction on the manaflow that would pull the stagnant mana along with it, increasing circulation and allowing for an improved rate of world growth.” The Mirror sounded almost excited as it read the information on the project.

Something seemed off to Serenity. He still wasn’t certain if this was dungeons or not, but that wasn’t the strange thing. “Why are the details of a meditation project stored in a repository focused on the interaction of creatures and magic?”

“The project was classified as magical and creature-affecting for two reasons. First, the improvement in Tier advancement through alternate mana circulation qualified. Second, the method proposed for increasing mana flow involved contests conducted using creatures developed by the specialized nodes through directed forced evolution. They are the reason the project was backed by the Lord of Monsters; he introduced a secondary goal. The repopulation of destroyed worlds from the nodal areas would prevent the disaster of a Lost World due to insufficient life remaining to maintain the mana cycle.”

Serenity ran over those words again; it took them a moment to really sink in. “You’re telling me that dungeon breaks aren’t a bug, they’re a feature?”

“The terminology “dungeon break” is unknown.” The Mirror didn’t seem all that interested, but that could have been Serenity’s horror instead of any actual lack of interest.

Serenity could guess what was meant by a Lost World from context; it was a bad thing. He wasn’t sure that the destruction of a world due to continual dungeon breaks was any better, however; Zon wouldn’t be in the place it was if dungeons didn’t overpopulate then release monsters.

It did explain the interest of the Lord of Monsters. Like any god, he was interested only in his own people and not in whoever he hurt to get what he wanted.