In order to save them you’ll have to make this connection stronger between me and you Locke. I’ve got the plans and controls all right here in front of me. Like a board game. You’re all here in cute little figurines I made while waiting… 

You could see it all and keep them all safe on their way to me. You just gotta project yourself to me. Connect stronger and be by me longer. That’s all I ask. Don’t be so stubborn. Otherwise you’ll lose one or two of them. Maybe even all of them. You do know they’re in here too. Nora already knows they’re trailing behind you. Why hasn’t she stopped you all to wait up for them? It’s almost like she isn’t concerned. Will summoners never learn?

Locke and Corin and Nora are grasping onto the side of the wall as the center of the hall has given way to a trap door revealing a buzz saw contraption with fire spewing from underneath. 

“Just keep close to the walls and watch your step. If we do this slowly we’ll make it.” Corin gulps trying not to look down but just ahead. She leads the charge. Nora behind her and Locke at the back end.

Nora… Locke thinks to himself real hard. To himself and at Nora. She turns to him and glares. Eyes a glow with a purple hue. 

What did she tell you? Nora transmits directly into Locke’s head. 

That Tye and Brent trail behind us. That we aren’t waiting up for them and that I’m to question your intentions. Locke thinks back. 

They’re in? Nora feigns back. Good. I’ll need them both no doubt… good. She turns her head and carries on 

See… she’s not to be trusted.. the demon head states in Locke’s mind. 

Nobody is ever to be truly trusted. All things are capable of selfish thoughts and all have desires. I’m to have faith in something, it's to have faith in my friends… Locke thinks back. 

So righteous so admirable. Hahaha look at your summoner so frustrated she can’t eavesdrop in. She’s trying to figure it out. Wanna know something? It’s kinda interesting. You like books you’re writing one. This is hers. Wanna read an earlier chapter. Get to know our little summoner?

That’s disgusting. She deserves her privacy as I do mine. Locke thinks back instantly. 

See that’s why I love you so... Oh my goodness that is you. Me? I’m wicked so let’s continue… you’ve got no say in this. Don’t worry I’ll keep control. It’s not that hard for me, I’ve been feeding for so long I can do most anything… oh I can’t wait for you to see what I’ve been up to. You’ll either love it or hate it and I will feed on those emotions so divine. 

A tool’s a tool. Locke thinks to himself out of the blue but it’s not his voice it’s Nora’s. Locke’s focus, having been upon the buzz saw, now casts past it into the flames below which begin to form an image. Memories. A vivid movie.

“Palius I don’t understand. Lady Nebula, she used her summons so carelessly. Most of them died. She gathered so many and just threw them away so carelessly.” 

“It would seem like it was careless but it was for a purpose. If the summons could die in our place then she could initiate the traps needed for the fire stone and Olcan clan to launch the ambushes.” Palius tells back. 

“The diamond king’s forces are greater and more prepared. They’re weathered and time tested for war. To go against them directly would be suicide. She knew it and it took all of her to convince her husband.” Palius continues walking around Nora in a circle. Nora is seated in the middle of a room similar to the one they’d been kept in before. Not much decoration. Before her a table and books of their history. This was a history lesson no doubt.

“You see summons need to be controlled and manipulated to do their part. They are strong but not strong enough so she needed them to be the pawns on the board to be discarded.” Palius continues “What is the point of rebelling and just dying? They’d committed themselves to the cause now all that was left to them was winning and living or losing and death.”

“So that was why her king left her?” Nora replies.

“The king betrayed the queen. He could not stomach the idea of surrendering his honor and sending those ghosts in to take our place. He ran in with his closest and strongest. To fight. That’s when she broke and fled the lands into the unconquerable place.”

“The rebel king broke away from his queen over her misuse of summons?” Nora states back. 

“No child the rebel king betrayed the Queen because he didn’t have the heart to lead an army incapable of defeating the diamond king in pitched battle as he’d always imagined. He had too much pride and with his pride he ran in and died.”

“Died or captured?” Nora replies.

“Died. As the Queen saw it. He ran straight into the legion with his most trusted in-arms. Unwilling to leave her stupid summons behind to be sacrificed. What a blunder.” Palius replies. 

“They weren’t even sentient. They were but wolves. They cursed us with their fur when she first pulled them forth. That’s what started the war. It was unexpected and the diamond king didn’t like the look. She was to be executed.” Nora finishes. 

“Yes, in the diamond king's realm there is no room for anything he does not curate and likes to be his own. He discards and throws it away.” Palius continues. “Art is subjective and his objective was to only keep the pieces that he personally likes protected. Away from everything else out of spite he’d smite anything he found off beat.”

“So when Ebba Nebula found her power and called forth those wolves she bound them to her instead of him and they gave her their fur as an honor?” Nora replies. 

“As a curse. This fur besmirches our form but we’ll cover that later.” Palius has a rod in his hand and whacks at her book to regain her focus. “You see the wolves had pride in their fur. Captured elements from their many voyages through. Conquests across the planes. They attained information and saved them into their coat of arms.”

“Their hair?” Nora replies back. 

“Yes child they fortified their power into their hair as a shield against the elements. Howling at moons and running after disaster. They had no true mind of their own. They walked the planes, an alpha wolf pack of nature’s carnal elements. Hunting mindlessly. They were a pack but all alone.” Palius continues. “That’s at least what Ebba Nebula perceived. She could not let such simple creatures gain so much power so she let them stand against our enemy and be devoured.”

“You’re telling me we have more enemies?” Nora asks.

“We are in eternity Nora… the only thing you need to know is that someone is going to come to collect your soul eventually.” Palius explains. “But we want it this way and they want it that way. What's made to stay? Nothing? Right? By what right does she have the might to say such things?” 

“The summoner feared she peered into a bit of a gambit. And was left stranded. That’s why you do not open your eyes upwards.” Palius continues.

“Because the gods are battling it out to figure out how things should be done?” She states

“”Precisely. And they’ll have their fun and it’ll trickle down the vine back to all of us.” 

“It’s just that the diamond king is taking too much for himself. He’s an elf but he wishes he was something better.” 

“A god?”

“A god.”

“Yes, nobody wants another one so everything is trying to keep it from happening.” Palius finishes.

“That’s insane. Gods do not interact with the planes they watch and observe and send in arbiters and avatars.” Nora replies.

“Lies.” Palius continues. 

“It is a game and I will explain. They cause distraction after distraction. I’m certain that those goblins are hiding something. The fire that burns from nothing? Makes no sense.” Palius continues.

“What are you trying to tell me of, Palius?” Nora finally bemoans.

“I’m trying to enlighten you about the situation. Dear child when you get your summons don’t become too attached to any of them. They’re place keepers. Sorry souls stripped from the void to act as your toys. In our stay to take the brunt of any mistake, enemy or disaster.” 

“There like a sacrifice then?” Nora gasps in disbelief.

“Blood makes the grass grow. Blood makes the lungs sing and the heart beats for it.” Palius informs her. “Do not ignore the truth of it. When you’ve a decision, pick us over them. They are discardable. Dispensable. They’ve only been put into this situation as a punishment for their own mistakes.”

“How can you say that?” Nora asks. 

“How could it be any other way. The Lord makes no mistakes and so here we are broken under this demon's curse because our king had too much pride and our queen denied her powers. She got sloppy and mopey and she began to think that she could save everything.” Palius states. 

“That’s when it happened?!” Nora gasps. “Nebula’s fall was when her summons betrayed her and killed everyone around. It was a massacre.”

“They reverted to their old ways. They were tired of being caged and they saw what she was doing to their brothers. Vengeance is a dangerous thing so keep these summons blind to things. It’s important.” Palius finishes. 

Obstacle 44. Atom