Jackal Among Snakes

Chapter 706: That Burning Question

Sophia watched the sky with bated breath. All that remained of the wound in the world was a small sliver of blackness. She felt that, any moment, Argrave would burst free of it, triumphant. Everyone else nearby seemed to hold that same thought, for they watched with anticipation equal to her own.

Yet a sudden crash by her side jolted her attention away. She looked to see Doctor Raven, fallen to his hands and knees. His body warped and twisted. A second, far louder crash made Sophia look beyond. There, the golden giant Law leaned up against his sword. His body emitted a golden mist—or rather, it was more accurate to say it became a golden mist.

Hause, too, fell. Lira, every surviving god—it looked like they’d been cut away from the strings holding them aloft. The whole of them began to fall apart. As Sophia’s mind spun searching for the answers, another had already reached the conclusion.

“It’s starting,” Elenore said simply. “He’s done it. Divinity…” she looked to her patron, the wizened Lira, who had collapsed. Next, her gaze went to Raven, who seemed to be struggling more than the gods. “Magic. They’re fading. It means Argrave… he did it.” She held her head, wincing with pain. Sophia assumed she was losing her blessing.

Sophia again looked up, around, everywhere for Argrave. When she found nothing, she looked to Anneliese, hoping. Despite how everyone seemed to be undergoing some manner of change, Anneliese remained suspended. Trapped, her face frozen into a smile, her body unmoving and unchangeable.

Sophia felt her heart beat quicker and quicker as everything around began to undergo change. Her panic only rose higher and higher. If magic and divinity truly faded, Anneliese might not be able to bring back Argrave.

She sought counsel, but all of them—foremost among them being Argrave—were absent. Elenore clutched her head in pain. Orion writhed as his various blessings underwent their changes. Even the taciturn Raven barely contained the sheer pain from whatever he endured, gritting a thousand teeth in silence. Those few unaffected urgently tended to those who were, leaving Sophia alone with this situation.

Sophia felt tremendous fear. She wanted Argrave here. Yet she looked to the sky, beyond the wound in the world. She saw the sun. Argrave’s sun, that he had placed on high to watch over them all. It persisted, gleaming as brilliantly gold as the first moment it had taken its place in the sky. That had to mean he was still here, still present. He would know what to do.

Sophia didn’t want to remake Argrave. She feared her power of creation more than anything. She had made lives, and her negligence had resulted in their death. She had tried to bring Castro back, but all that she’d created was a hollow imitation. Raven had taught her much and more… but deep down, she knew whatever she created would still be but a hollow imitation.

The only one who could truly bring Argrave back was Anneliese. And if magic faded, that might never happen.

from the

the Spark of Eternity, Sophia withdrew her hand in shock. She looked up at Anneliese’s smiling face, wavering. Was that something she should toy with? She felt if she wasn’t careful, it might swallow her up. Yet… Anneliese had already braved that. She’d

said. And if I can’t… maybe

worse than one deprived of Sophia. With that in mind, Sophia

reached toward eternity,

#####

staring at a familiar gray office keyboard that had the WASD keys worn down so much as to be illegible, he felt in equal parts a wave of nostalgia and repulsion. Looking around, he saw it all—his cheap wireless headset, his two monitors, cans of energy drinks on

tale has been unlawfully lifted without the author's consent. Report any appearances on

missed it,” came a woman’s

wearing clothes he hadn’t seen in

close to the ceiling fan spinning above. Whether the synthetic light of the lightbulb, the constant noise of the fan, or the

of these sensations could compare to

sense of hearing, of sight. He hadn’t realized how much magic had become a fundamental part of his perception of the world around him until he’d lost it. Still, he’d spent more of his life without it than he ever had with

A full life ahead of you. Very little pain and suffering. The comforts and ease brought about by technology.” She took a deep breath. “You must miss those amenities,

all in. Conditioning built through decades made him hesitant to break anything in here, even after being apart for many years. He should’ve known these

past, he might’ve

held his right hand out.

bent and tore everything around him, expelling it outward and compelling it inward concurrently until the walls, the floors, everything, began to disintegrate. He rose his hand up higher and higher as that sphere of destruction grew larger

and all the parts that constructed a human. It stripped it all away, until the