Домагой Курмаич - Mother of Learning

"You didn’t include Fortov among those who received the marker," Ilsa observed quietly.

"No," Zorian whispered back. "He’s useless and I don’t like him."

Ilsa had nothing to say in response to that, just giving him a guarded look in return.

Maybe he really was a little harsh towards Fortov. Still, he honestly couldn’t see any good reason to give the guy a temporary marker. Fortov was unreliable and had no work ethic, so including him in the time loop would be about as wise as including Kirielle.

Eventually they boarded the train and set off towards Cyoria. Kirielle became more wary of Ilsa when she realized the teacher was going to stay in the same compartment as them, but… well, it was Kirielle. Patience was never her strong suit. She barely lasted half an hour before she started bombarding Ilsa with questions.

Ilsa was a patient woman, but after an hour and a half of Kirielle’s chattiness, Zorian could feel she was starting to get rather exasperated with the whole situation. Thus, he decided to have mercy on her and distracted his little sister with a bunch of visually impressive illusions and stories.

Ilsa observed the illusionary scenes he conjured up with a surprising amount of interest. Try as he might, he just couldn’t figure out what she found so fascinating about those. Weren’t they just illusions? She was a mage at the continent’s best magical academy. Surely she had seen plenty of those in her life…

Eventually he decided to ask her. Since he didn’t want Kirielle to listen in on them, he established a mental link to her and spoke to her telepathically. She was badly startled at first, flinching at the sudden voice in her head, but she recovered quickly. Her response was swift and smooth, with no unintentional thoughts leaking through. It was clear that she had experience with this kind of communication.

[You can ignore the shaping disruption of the train wards,] Ilsa telepathically sent back through the link. [I mean, of course you can. For someone like you, doing that is a minor thing. I could do it too. However, casting such sophisticated illusions while being suppressed by the wards… that takes considerable skill. Did you say you were trying to pretend you are somewhat normal ? How is this even remotely normal?]

[Err, well… it’s not like Kirielle can really tell how amazing this is,] he sent back lamely.

Truthfully, neither could he until this point. He learned these illusions pretty much solely to entertain Kirielle. They were just little tricks to him, and so was the ability to bypass the laughable disruption wards on the train. It completely slipped his mind that someone like Ilsa could figure out exactly what he was doing and how difficult it was and find it notable.

[So,] Ilsa sent. [You are good enough at combat magic to fight a thousand-year-old lich. You are a mind mage and an illusionist. You can teleport around with ease and open dimensional gates. You can create duplicates of yourself. You are an expert golem maker, with all that implies. You say you achieved all of that in, what, eight years?]

[Pretty much, yeah,] Zorian confirmed.

[Forgive me for being blunt here Mister Kazinski, but aren’t you a fairly average mage?] Ilsa asked curiously. [I never got an impression that you are some amazingly talented person from the information I was given. And trust me, people had looked into it. Whenever a world-class talent like Daimen appears, their family is always investigated in case their boons run in the blood.]

[Aside from being an innate mind mage, I am indeed pretty average,] Zorian said calmly. Ilsa’s comment might have infuriated him once, but these days he no longer cared. [I know what you’re thinking, and yes – my rapid growth as a mage is all due to the time loop. It doesn’t just give time, you know. It’s also given me nigh-limitless resources, access to restricted materials and plenty of normally unobtainable experience. It’s also put me under enormous pressure, keeping me constantly motivated in a way I otherwise wouldn’t be. I honestly think anyone could do what I did, if put in the same position. Well, provided they didn’t just break under the pressure…]

Ilsa stayed quiet for a while, but Zorian could practically feel the gears turning in her head. She was probably realizing for the first time the sort of amazing opportunity the time loop represented.

[I think I’m getting just a tiny bit jealous of you, Mister Kazinski,] Ilsa eventually concluded.

[Don’t envy me just yet,] he told her. [There is still a good chance that I will get erased in the end, and everything I have worked for will be for naught.]

[What?] she asked, startled. [What do you mean?]

With that, he started explaining the situation in detail to her. He told her about Red Robe, the uncertainty about whether they could even get out of the time loop, the problems he had to solve to survive the exit, and so on.

It took a while to go through everything. Strangely enough, Ilsa looked calmer and more reassured by the end, even though he had just told her there was a big chance they would all lose everything at the end. Then again, maybe it wasn’t so strange. She already knew that temporary markers like her own only lasted six months. Compared to that, a more distant deadline that would also destroy Zach and Zorian probably didn’t seem so intimidating. On the contrary, she may have found it reassuring that they also had the same fate waiting for them, if they failed.

[I was wondering why you decided to include so many people in this time loop, instead of just monopolizing the whole thing for yourself and Zach. Your situation is quite desperate,] she said, humming to herself audibly enough for Kirielle to hear her and give her funny looks.

[You don’t have to sound so happy about it,] Zorian groused. [But yes, we really do need your help badly.]

Ilsa was mostly included because of her connections. Though she acted a bit low key most of the time, she knew many people and was owed quite a few favors. Hopefully, she could help them convince people to go along with whatever crazy plans they came up with and smooth any ruffled feathers they caused along the way. Considering how few other members of their little conspiracy were diplomatically inclined or familiar with bureaucratic wrangling, this was a valuable skill.

Plus, she was a powerful alteration expert. Zorian wasn’t sure, but he felt she might be able to help him produce his golems faster. She couldn’t animate them, of course, but he was currently producing such a large number of them every restart that it took a while to simply create enough mechanical bodies for animation. If Ilsa was as good at alteration and material alchemy as Xvim claimed, she should be able to take over that part of the production process and free Zorian to do other things.

[Why not just hire someone to do that for you?] Ilsa asked when he told her that. [I hear from Xvim you’ve been doing that a lot already.]

[I can’t,] Zorian shook his head. [Anyone I contract will surely figure out what I intend to do with such a sophisticated metal doll, and making combat-capable golems is forbidden without a license.]

[Makes sense,] Ilsa said. [You don’t want to have random mages building themselves a private army of golems in their free time.]

[Exactly,] Zorian said. [I might be able to coax a person to build me a single puppet, but if I order a batch of twenty puppets, they’ll freak out. Nobody wants to get implicated in an attempted rebellion or whatever. I’d be lucky if they didn’t immediately report me to the government when they throw me out of the shop.]

Ilsa nodded. After some thought, she changed the subject. [You know, all this talk about golem and alteration is reminding me of something I thought of when you were explaining how the time loop works. Destroying the entire world and then recreating it out of nothing… it reminds me of a persistent ambition of mine…]