I left the bead within my domain with Prender. I didn't get any notifications for removing Jeremy's souls from Urth, so I figured this was probably ok. Then I turned my sights on my next job: Patricia.

The army marched south and west, having skirted around the Himalayas and where the joined the seemingly artificial Worldspine mountain range, around where Pakistan should be. Even on the subcontinent, winter had bitten hard and everywhere was ice and snow.

How many had I killed by starting a war between Life and Sun? The numbers… Even by the most jaded and cynical assessment of humanity, I'd killed more innocents through that action than the worst mass murderers from the old world. Pot Pot, Stalin, Hitler… Had I surpassed them all?

No field army came out to meet us, and we weren't harassed as we advanced. I could feel her, pulsing in my perception whenever I bothered to use Hunter's Gaze, but she never moved as far as I could tell.

She must have known we were coming for her. What Thoth might have told her about my intentions remained a mystery, so perhaps her lack of action boded well.

As the days passed, we neared her Academy. She had built a bloody ivory tower, which made me chuckle as I saw it creeping closer over the horizon. Around it lay a sprawling city, sunbaked bricks crumbling under the unusual assault of the cold. Not designed for anything other than tropical weather, the freeze-thaw cycle as the winter took hold had caused significant damage that was still being repaired.

We treated the locals with respect, sharing food and supplies where we could. Soon enough, another train of hopeless souls trailed after my army, this time of their own volition.

We stopped a few miles from the outskirts of her city and set up camp. As the legionaries and the nomads made the area secure, trouble naturally flared up.

I sat in front of the chief's fire, Faye to one side and Kril standing behind me like an evil vizier. The complainant knelt before us on the other side of the flames, then rose to his feet. Dark eyes flashed in the flickering light as he glared at me.

"Lord, a little more would save so many!" he exclaimed.

"Shit-sitters. Mond, we've been more than generous," Kril muttered. "They shouldn't have followed us."

"We didn't stop them," I said softly, admiring the fierceness of the representative the camp followers had sent to meet with me.

"We bloody couldn't! We chased off the first few thousand, but they kept coming. They don't understand the real world, sitting in their hovels rather than being free," called Jagapan from his seat off to my right.

"Victories bring their own curse," Faye said so quietly that only I could hear her. She wasn't wrong.

"Your army isn't lacking for food or heat. You have more than you need, and we are suffering for want of things you don't require!" Something was off about this man. He seemed to be noble and neat and tidy… but some part of me was scratching at an itch, and I'd long since learned to trust my instincts.

"They shouldn't have left their towns," I said. "Now they have, of their own free will, it's my problem?" I asked coldly.

"It's their problem that you can alleviate, if you choose."

"What's your name?"

"Hargitzen."

"Lord."

"Pardon?"

"Lord. I've yet to meet a local who didn't bow and scrape and call me lord. Who are you really?" I asked. I saw the Fangs tense and inch forward from the corner of my eye.

"You don't remember me? I wonder where your ship's captain has gone? We tracked him as far as the Worldspine, then shortly after he joined you, something changed."

"You were the emissary? Shin… two? Something like that."

"Shintzu, Warlord. A pleasure to see you again." The artefact-induced illusion dropped away, and a familiar face was revealed. I held up a hand to stop the nomads from surging forward. The looming presence of the Huskar shifted slightly as hands reached for weapons.

"We have our own group of people who don't receive souls," I said.

"I'd like to meet them," Shintzu replied, earning a snort of laughter from Kril that made him cock his head in the Dreamer's direction.

"No. You wouldn't. They don't talk more than they need to. They're more… practically minded. It's good to see you again. How was your journey home?"

"I've had worse voyages. The seas were surprisingly calm. Your responsibility?"

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"Hardly." I snorted. "Poseidon and I don't exactly get along. Maybe I distracted the bitch."

He glanced around nervously. I let my aura be felt, suffusing the air around us.

"Thoth can't see what happens here, Scholar."

"These knives… They can cut?"

"Fuck all point to knives that can't cut, bloke," I said with a chuckle. "The only god currently watching you is me."

"You are not a god."

"Yet." The finality in my voice stilled any quick reply. He looked me over, assessed my companions and then nodded decisively.

"The Lady of the Tower would speak with you, Raymond Cobbler."

"I'd like to have a word with her, to be honest. I haven't just popped in to say hello for obvious reasons. Can you help a bloke out?"

He shifted uneasily. "You are a man of honour?"

"Hold!" I barked as Kos, Jandak, and a dozen chiefs surged toward the skinny man. They froze and inched backwards slowly, glaring at the emissary. "That is not something to ask a nomad lightly. I'm not one of them by birth, but they treat me as one of their own. To answer your question: I'd like to think so, but I often fall short of the standards I set myself."

So many innocents. The wars, the winter, I could no longer pretend to have kept to my code. But that was ok. I was coming to terms with it.

"I… did not expect a seemingly honest answer," Shintzu said.

"Hah. You should try and get him not to murder a rival faction's diplomat! Bastard just up and said 'yep, I killed him'!" Jagapan laughed.

"That was one of Mortimer's men. He wasn't what he pretended to be," I objected.

"No shit. Glad I didn't sign up with that poor bastard. I'd have been a bandaged man or truly dead by now if I had!"

"If you don't mind, I can facilitate a meeting between the Warlord and the Lady," Shintzu offered.

"You want him to go alone?" Jandak snarled.

"He is never alone, I think. We all carry the souls of those we've slain with us."

"Fuck your twittering. A man chased by ghosts can still step foot into his enemy's lair like an idiot. Mond–"

"Kos, it's fine. Patricia doesn't have to be my enemy." My brother-in-law glared at me, then glanced at my wife. I felt a gentle hand land on my left arm.

"Love. I don't trust it either."

"What does he desire?" I asked softly, putting my hand over her own.

She squinted and shifted in her chair. "Peace. An end to… hunger? No. Not hunger for food. Hunger for something else."

"I wish an end to ignorance. Those masses chasing your army do it because they don't know better. They beg and pressure you because they sense power, a victor, and want to earn a place in your good graces. We all cast ripples out around us; you have a chance to use them to shape a better world. That is what you want."

He didn't frame it as a question. And he wasn't wrong. I wasn't going to let this world be unmade like toys being put back in a box. I needed it to live and thrive. Faye and my boy would have to make a life here.

"It is. Patricia has been ignoring my calls on the communication cube-thing. Seems like she doesn't want to talk."

"The Lady is willing if you are," Shintzu said with a deep bow.

I stood and stepped around the fire. He straightened and tensed as I drew closer, but he didn't shy away. The man had courage.

"I'll meet her."

"Mond!" Jandak barked. "You'll need an escort," he added more gently as I turned to look at him.

I swivelled my head back to Shintzu and smiled gently. "No, old friend. I won't. Shintzu, you've got a trinket to open a long-range portal, I think? That's impressive magic, something worth protecting and sharing in the future with people you can trust. But you don't need it now."

I opened a divine portal to the top of Patricia's tower and stepped through, turning back to wave the stunned man to join me.

"I'm here," I announced.

The room was bare. Four large windows set in what appeared to be the cardinal directions opened out onto a view of the sprawling city below, but mostly onto empty sky and endless frozen grasslands. Patricia's sanctum, which I had just casually invaded, was ascetic. The furniture was simple, other than the bookshelves that dominated the walls, crammed with tomes and scrolls.

"Guards!"

"Really? You're doing that?" I muttered, preparing my aura for violence.

"Lady! I'm here, he came at my request!" Shintzu called out.

Patricia emerged from behind a dividing wall. She was thin. Her face was drawn, and the white robes she wore hung from her frame.

"So you've come to finish it," she said softly. She ran a hand along the spines of a row of books, looking at them sadly.

"Not finish it. Your god told me we might be able to come to an arrangement."

"Of course you spoke to my sponsor," she said bitterly. "What's the point of any of this when you've already won?" She fixed him with a hateful glare.

"I… This world doesn't have to die."

"Yes, Raymond, it does. You've made that inevitable." She pulled a scroll down and unrolled it gently. "This is a native thesis on crop rotation. All their own work."

"You didn't nudge them along a bit?" I asked, stepping away from the portal and closing it. My aura was pulled in close around my body, ready to defend against a sudden attack.

"No. Not directly."

"But you helped someone who helped them."

"Shakri Tanul came up with the idea entirely independently," she hissed, spinning to glare at me. Her eyes were sunken, heavy bags darkening the skin beneath them. Her flesh clung to her bones like she hadn't eaten properly for a few weeks.

"You look like shit, prof."

"And you look hale and hearty. This world agrees with you."

"It does. I want it to continue. Been a long time since that drawing room in Mortimer's house. You've changed."

"Not in any meaningful way. You have, though"

"There's no need for this to be confrontational. Yeah, I changed. I've got more changes to come, but I'm not willing to let this world be destroyed."

"You'll win. Ascend or whatever they are saying you'll do. Then you won't care. What's their name, the god you're replacing?"

She knew more than I'd expected her to, but she wasn't right in the head.

"Tezca. That's the short version."

"The god of killing."

"Yup. If you were expecting shame, you'll be disappointed."

"No shame, Raymond. It's what you are."

"That's not all I am, dammit. I'm trying to find a way to spare you."

"How kind. What will you do if I resist?"

I filled the air with my aura, not to intimidate her or the already terrified Shintzu. I wanted this conversation to be private. "Stick you in storage like Jeremy. As long as one of you lives, this world cannot be unmade. Some bullshit rules about the authority used to ship us here. But you could do a lot for Urth if you were free. A lot of good."

"And what will you do?"

"Kill Poseidon for what she did to us. Then… I don't know. I'll have the rest of the God of Killing in my head. Eventually… I won't be me anymore."

"Or you could go home. Kill me, kill Jeremy and go home."

"It's not my home anymore, Patricia. I don't think it's where you want to be either."

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