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Unlimited One-Day Delivery and more. There's a problem loading this menu at the moment. Your recently viewed items and featured recommendations. View or edit your browsing history. Joseph recognized him as Arcus, the elder who was ostracized from Babeldel. He was of great age, a being of renown abilities, and more alien looking every time Joseph laid eyes upon him--as if the elder had spent too long a time in that alien vessel, and it had transformed him into a monstrosity of the flesh.
Alas, Arcus was the last true remnant of humanity, for the order of the nine ministers had enslaved the minds of those they resurrected. It mused Joseph that one who looked so inhuman was kind and wise. Yet, those fairer in flesh and held in high regard at the citadel were truly the monsters that tormented the souls of the dead. Marcus Anton admires the tapestries in the high floor of the library. Lidivic Seth studiously pours through the books in Dr.
Arcus' smaller collection of antiquities in a private suite. Gripped in a vice is a glove with an open panel. Surrounding the litter of screwdrivers and needles are numerous schematics scribbled in a crabbed hand. Marcus [mashing on grapes from the pocket of his jacket, Marcus whispers to himself]: Lovely and quiet were these halls of old days gone by. Good of you to join me, lad. A man cannot be alone too long, even if he is no longer truly a man.
Surely my colleague knows that eating is prohibited in the library. Indeed [mashing on a second grape] your colleague knows it. But your professor also knows better than to waste haggling over conventions no longer in the service of those who've outlived their enforcements.
Besides, being older--and possibly the wiser--does have its priviledges, if not the advantages of enthusiasm. I see that silly old rule you so curtly conjured up hasn't stopped our best man from drinking when and where he wants? Pulls out two glasses. Fills the first near full.
And just what the professor ordered. Marcus [licking dry stained lips]: No--fill it up to the max. Go on, fill it till it near spills. No need to be conservative. You remember how lovely this private floor was in the halcyon days, don't you? A pity old Jon never did build that refuge in the mountains he so loved.
All of them entirely preserved well over two centuries. I've done what I can. Taking time to think. Perhaps you've done 'all' that you can. Perhaps it is time for you to leave this place. Put the past to rest. I hear the past as plain as it were yesterday--albeit, a hologram of sounds filters into my inner ear at this very moment. I sometimes just listen until madness seizes me. I just can't leave all this I won't accept 'no' for an answer. You wither away here. In Babeldel you will be reborn a god.
Others will do your labors--while you, yourself, are free to pursue your destiny. Pour us another drink. Such discussions can make a man feel dry. Another bottle of Burgundy? It's the blood of the gods. To Jon it is. Ah, young master Lidivic. He's finished his pillaging of Jon's property at last. He probably expects us in the dinning hall. Better go over and catch up with him. To close the private library for the last time, and to seal Jon's private quarters.
The three sit down for a meal at an overly large table--where once upon a time the nine seated themselves here to learn the wisdom of Jon Arcus, and to realize the world's most terrible fate was reversible only by decoding the Lore of Dead Authors. Lidivic [silently penning notes alongside his untouched supper plate]. Devon [passing another helping of weasel stew to Marcus]. Another fine meal prepared by our more than generous host. You have some very handy talents. I'm flattered to say the least. Ah, but it's true. Not one of the maidens can cook up such a fine feast as you've mastered.
Not one, I tell you! I could advise them when I've settled down in Citibaad. Did I miss something while the two of you drank the daylight away? Only the finest paintings of daylight you'll not ever see in the worlds to come--nor in the dark centuries to pass. You're flare for words is such a talent, Marcus. I wonder how you manage to say so much and eat so much more than the rest of us at the same time.
Why, I out to teach you some of my talents, young minister. Two and a half thousand years from now, and you'll be able to hold a steady conversation half as well as this old boy. Oh, please-please, be seated with us and dine. I have decided to come with you to Citibaad--if it's no burden? I'd like help in anyway that I can. Why don't be silly. Marcus and I were hoping you'd join us anyway. I gathered as much. All the same, I'm afraid that I might be of a burden to your plans. Don't be a half-wit, Lidivic! You know as well as I do that he has watched over this library of treasures for two hundred years.
Likewise, he'd relish the idea of getting as far away from this city as possible. I think I understand. It would be a burden more for you than for me. We planned our route to the loft of Tempus together, remember. I was merely taking the burden as a scapegoat for us. Oh, yes of course. Lidivic [musing at the pen in his soup]. I will go with you to Tempus if you so wish.
To be frank, I'd much like to recover the Zodiacron to study it a bit more. I don't see any reason why not. Let us discuss it further over in the head master's private study. Bio-lamps illuminate gradually upon sensing the three warmth bodies entering the headmaster's private study. Lidivic [Seating himself at Jon's desk]. Marcus [Seating himself in a wide, leather club chair]. Never would I have expected you to abandon your library so readily. I merely kept it tidy in memory of our savior. Savior, yes--well, you've kept yourself busy over two and a half centuries, haunting these halls as if they were your own.
I won't deny a certain sense of lordship; if one truly believes that his own home is indeed his castle. Yet, contradictorily, this is not my own home. Are we then to believe that our Devon D. Oh, what are you getting at, Lidivic?! Two hundred years have elapsed without a word from Jon. He's long been dead--or at best we should consider him to be.
This is precisely my point. Our humble host has been careful not to mention much over the remnants of Jon's work. Some of it was left behind. As I had said since that first day you arrived here nearly two years ago, I was never given the wisdom of Jon's work. And so I avoiding prying into his personal study room. Devon wouldn't know anything about Jon's secretive works--if Jon indeed had any. Personally, I think it's a bunch of rubbish.
Jon never had time with all the preparation and training he'd given us. What is time to a wizard? And such a wizard was Dr. I still don't understand.
What are you going on about? One for you dear Marcus. I'll prepare my own. You know that there was a manual Jon kept which had been decoded from the alien scripted language of the dark spheres. Partially decoded, young lord. You mean to tell me that Jon Arcus decoded the entire manual himself? Or nearly decoded the manual to its entirety. He spoke of no one else aiding him in the translation of that manual. And even if there was an aid from outside our order, half the book itself was missing!
You're ordinarily much sharper. I'm amused that you do not see the answer plainly, even when it is looking back at you! Oh, not me old friend. Jon never asked for assistance from anyone. As you say, it is rubbish. Must you go on Lidivic? Jon was a sharp judge of character, but I suspected that he'd faltered with some of his choices. And yet not so. We all kept in the dark. Jon knew our personalities well enough to wager when we'd err. I mean to say that Jon knew nearly without a doubt that Marcus Anton would see the autocracy better suited under the rule of a theocracy.
He understood my weak points as well. I like a good mystery as much as the next intellectual, but I do not see how it is that you've arrived at this conclusion. Is this not but merely your own conjecture?
Or do you have evidence to support your facts? What do you mean 'me'? I am the evidence you seek. Either one of you! For pity sake, spit out the fat. Yes, I know this part already. I didn't tag along deaf and dumb. Hear him out, Marcus. As I was saying We were given special instructions never to disclose our purpose with the other members of the order.
An invisible elite in the hierarchy of the order? We were instructed not to alter the decisions of the ministers, but to observe only and maintain our secret pact Along with various duties to carry out. Mainly to keep quiet. Which we've now just broken by telling you.
What other duties did Jon give you? To keep various secrets. Some of which I keep to this day. And to log everything. A lot of good that would do you. Every book in the Citadel was probably burned up or lost in the war against Necrotep. We did not log everything into journals alone, for which I still keep quite a collection here in my own quarters of this library. A journal would be prone to dishonest and biased entries.
I found Fredrick after what felt as if an epoch had passed over the realms of the undead. I simply didn't care what was happening. You think that I didn't know you looked into my things? Don't keep a lady waiting! You wither away here.
You mean to tell me that you logged everything into the Zodiacron? Along with all records of the ministry's activities? Devon [turns his back to his companions to make more coffee]. That is indeed what I am telling you. I can see that there are many good reasons to get the Zodiacron back into our possession. But, these reasons dwarfed next to what you have just told me now. But, there is another reason.
One we all wish to know. Go on, young sorcerer. The bio-telepathic structure of the citadel is unstable. Yes, and apparently Necrotep had managed to control the citadel when he last manifested. With the Zodiacron we could re-wire the chaos mechanism to block out Necrotep's species for good. And of more immediate importance is the means for restoring the seals to the prison of Necrotep. As well as how to construct new devices for doing the same with other such menaces from beyond the spheres.
I believe professor knows best here. The two of you are forgetting one very important distinction between the necrotep seals and the cog-helm to control the citadel. The book of dead authors is the secret to the seals, and that portion of the book is also missing. A temporary set back. The other half of the book, along with what we suspect to be an entire library of books beyond our current technology, rests inside the soul grid of that computer.
The Zodiacron contains the key seals and the other half of the book? And much, much more old Marcus! As I've been in touch with the neurotep circuit's god-form, I am now aware of a means for securing the citadel, as well as for snuffing out the location of that Zodiacron. I've finished the last component to building the glove of souls. I will explain it to you in due time how it might be used to refortify our citadel, and in acquiring the Zodiacron from the Order of the Cloth. There is not much else ones such as us could want. I would like to study the Zodiacron myself, having never had a chance to actually use it.
And study it we shall do together. But getting it is going to be a problem. What could possibly stand between us and the crater filled ruins of Tempus? I've suspected as much. I don't mean to sound absurd. But, what mutants are there? And why should we have any trouble with them? Do you recall the tower of skulls we came across on the pier of this city?
Near the waste cap? The smoking mountain of skulls and brimstone? Are the mutants the ones responsible for that shrine to death?
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