Calling a Dragon

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Contrary to his expectations, Ahsch’s talk with his wife the following morning was short and held no room for discussion. “You do not get to tell me how I’m allowed to mourn,” she informed him, bluntly, her gaze steely. “_Especially _not in regards to… this.”

Any attempt on his part to try and debate the point was shot down, quickly and harshly, and he eventually gave up, perturbed as he was; Avery was normally willing to at least hear him out, even when it had come to Fauna, or Kirasiel. She didn’t always agree with him, or necessarily listen, but she at least let him say his piece and would give it even a moment of thought. So for her to simply unilaterally ignore him was… unusual.

Concerning.

But Ahsch hadn’t been married to her for several months now without learning when to pick his fights, so he (reluctantly) let it go. _Perhaps she’ll be willing to actually talk things through when it’s not so… close, he thought.- - - - - -

_

In a lull between planning and practicing and training and learning, Ahsch stared at a blank parchment, the feather of a quill brushing repeatedly across his lips as he thought. _ I can’t afford to _leave to see my family, he rationalized. And summoning them here out of the blue would be… rude, to say the least. But I shouldn’t put this off any longer - no, that’s not fair, I shouldn’t allow myself to be distracted from dealing with it any longer. Then he sighed. “Fuck it all,” he gritted out, dropping the quill back into the inkwell and leaning back, his eyes screwed shut in frustration. I need a solution to the time problem, now.

Then his eyes cracked open. Phashim promised to help… ‘next time.’ But when is that going to be? Idly, he sensed out his bond with the Mystical Calamity. Then, a thought occurred to him. One he considered for several long minutes, weighing the risks of the idea.

“Fuck it all,” he repeated, tugging on the bond.

A few seconds later, Mahat chuckled dryly in his mind. Rwnil wants to know just how suicidal you’re feeling today.

Ahsch rolled his eyes. Of course she felt that. Hopefully Phashim did too…

A directed blast of Mana, of Presence let him know that the dragon had, indeed, felt his call. Wincing, Ahsch struggled out of his seat and made his way to the garden, where PHashim was waiting.

“I am not some slave to come running at your whim, godling,” she snarled, leaking Mana and the sheer weight of her existence warping her voice and the air around her.

Ahsch’s instincts screamed at him to prostrate himself in fear and submission.

Enochiel’s intuition grabbed at one of His domains. “I am not a pup to be scolded, Phashim,” Ahsch replied evenly, some slight divine authority and dominance laced into his own words. “And I do not call you here on a whim, but to have you fulfill your last promise.”

The dragon glared at him, seething, but eventually reigned in her rampant Mana and restrained her presence. “Very well,” she gritted, and Ahsch had to fight not to ‘reward’ her with a ‘good girl.’

He didn’t want to be turned into so much red paste again.

“Before you ask, there are two key things I want to accomplish,” Ahsch said, preempting Phashim. “The first, as I said last we spoke, is making a sort of afterlife, a realm for souls I bind to go to when they die. Perhaps not permanently - I’ll admit, I’m not sure how that all works, and I’d rather not piss off any more gods than I have to, the relatively ‘benign’ attention of one is more than enough -” Phashim snorted at the reference to her mother “- but the other goal I have is to find a way to get more time; time to train, to learn, to practice, to… grow. I had the idea to make a small demi-plane or whatever and speed up the time within it, allowing me to spend days or weeks or months inside of it, while only a few hours or days pass in the real world.”

Phashim’s eyebrow rose as she contemplated what he said. “The ‘afterlife’ goal is relatively straightforward,” she eventually said. “Most deities I’m aware of - and even some non-deities - have them, for obvious reasons.”

“Do you?”

The dragon’s nostrils flared. “Your second goal is… more complicated. Dealing with time is always a tricky - and often dangerous - proposition. Though your Innate Magic to age yourself gives you a starting point, which is more than many have.” She thought for a moment. “As is your Innate Magic to manipulate gravity - I assume you’re already aware of the connection between gravity and space?”

Ahsch nodded. “And vaguely aware that space and time are connected, though I’m less firm on the concepts,” he supplied. “Though I know gravity is heavily involved - black holes and such.”

Phashim raised an eyebrow. “Black…” she started, then shook her head. “It is of no matter. As I do not wish to waste time here, I shall demonstrate the latter for you myself, and teach you within.”

Ahsch blinked. “You mean you…” he started. But he was cut off when, quite suddenly, he found himself standing in a clouded starscape, his feet resting on nothing. Soft, midnight-colored clouds hung in small clusters, almost like structures of some kind, whilst beyond them the dark violet infinity stretched, a rainbow of stars standing or spinning or drifting or streaking across the eternities.

“Time in here is roughly a hundred times swifter than on Euphoria,” Phashim stated, boredly. “You will probably be restricted to only a factor of ten or so, depending on the spell you develop.” The dragon stretched, then sat down on the non-existent floor of the demi-world, lounging back and gesturing for Ahsch to do the same.