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A frown settled over Hump’s face. If he was right—if this door was truly where Samuel Durain had once been imprisoned—it was no longer a matter of deciphering the door, but convincing Glyndaril to help him open it. The thought sat poorly with him. Convincing the spirit of a divine being to help free one of the gods responsible for his master’s imprisonment and his own death was no small thing.
“You’re going to need to speak to Glyndaril, aren’t you?” Celaine said quietly.
Hump let out a sigh. “Yes.”
“I didn’t know it worked like that,” Dylan said. “Can you actually talk with him? It always sounded more like impressions and visions.”
“It’s not really a conversation,” Hump admitted. “More like… standing in front of a wall that occasionally shakes its head. He’s answered me before, just not with many words. He said Not Yet dramatically a couple of times.”
“Oh good,” Emilia said. “He has all the vocabulary he needs then. If this is the same place, he won’t be easy to convince.”
Hump sighed again. “Yeah… Not easy.”
“Why not?” Bud asked.
Hump turned to him and spread his hands helplessly. “If you were in his place, would you?”
Bud considered that, then shook his head. “We still don’t know if this story about the Pantheon is even true. And even if it is, Glyndaril has never denied you when you truly needed it before. He’s stopped you, sure, but he’s always let you take that next step.”
The words hit harder than Hump expected.
Bud had a point. Even knowing that there was a spirit in his spellbook, he still didn’t quite think of it that way, and perhaps he didn’t value the things Glyndaril had done to help him in the past enough. The restrictions on him had once made it difficult for it to lend aid, but when he’d needed it, Glyndaril had been there. The Binding of Thirteen to defeat the dragon of Bledsbury deciphering the Greater Gateway left behind by the warlocks beneath Fort Nordric and then granting him its full powers when they had needed to follow the warlocks and demons out of the Infernal Halls and into the Remnant realm.
“You’re right,” Hump said. “I don’t know why I was so pessimistic. Give me some time to figure this out and I’ll see what I can do. And keep an eye on those spectres. Glyndaril’s essence may cause a change in them.”
“You do what you need to do,” Emilia said. “Leave everything else to us.”
Celaine gave his hand a squeeze. “I’ll take care of Nisha. Good luck.”
Hump managed a small smile. “Thank you.”
While the others spread out, Hump moved a short distance from the door and sat cross-legged on the cold stone. Far enough that the door’s magic shouldn’t interfere with him too much.
The Book of Infinite Pages rested in his lands, its cover worn and familiar, Glyndaril’s presence completely concealed within. He placed it across his lap and laid a hand gently on the leather surface.
How many times had he done this before? The touch was familiar. Comforting. And yet, today it felt like he was about to knock on the door of something he shouldn’t. It made him think of Nishari, and how she might act in a similar situation to Glyndaril. Such anger—such grief—did not leave.
He drew a slow, deep breath, steadying both his nerves and the churning waves of essence through his channels. “Show me your heart, Glyndaril,” he whispered.
At once, the book stirred beneath his palm, shuddering like a creature roused from sleep. A thin stream of blue light bled from the seams of the spine, curling upward in ghostly wisps. Essence flowed through the leather, revealing the cracked texture of the grain and the veins of power within. Every crack, every crease, every fold began to glow, until the whole book shone with radiance.
The leather beneath his palm warmed, then softened, losing its rigid texture. The air thickened, not with heat, but with intent. Hump felt Glyndaril settle over him, heavy and unmistakeable. This was not the distant, watchful awareness he had grown used to, but something focused. Something looking back.
As quickly as he’d made the realisation, he felt a tug on his soul. It was subtle at first, like a thread pulled taut, but that feeling only grew. Hump resisted on instinct, but only for a moment before he let it happen.
The world vanished. The stench of blood and ash was gone. Hump found himself once more in the endless expand of blue sky. There was no ground beneath his feet. Nothing in any direction but the occasional cloud. And before him stood the Silver Owl.
Glyndaril was only as tall as Hump’s waist, but his presence loomed like a statue. His wings were folded behind his back, the silver feathers shimmering with a moonlight radiance. The owl’s beak was curved and sharp, and his eyes were fixed solely on Hump, burning with that same blue light as the spellbook.
Intent rose from the owl in a controlled surge, brushing against Hump’s soul with the power of divine. There was rage in there, old and unrestrained, and at least a little of it was directed at him.
Hump swallowed, his throat suddenly dry. “It’s been some time, Glyndaril.”
The owl said nothing. He didn’t move, didn’t even blink, yet Hump felt himself studied beneath that burning gaze.
“I must enter that door,” Hump said, “and I cannot do it without you.”
NO.
Glyndaril’s voice was as loud as thunder. It came at Hump frown all directions, not from the owl himself, but from this place—a from the endless blue that surrounded them. That rage Hump sensed before was amplified tenfold. It pressed in on his soul like a knife to his throat.
“Loften is in that room,” Hump said. “Am I right in that this was where your master, Samuel Durain was sealed away all those years ago? Am I right that it was in this place where you were killed? Yet still I must enter. The seals are broken, and the Path to Heaven is open. Loften is our only way out of this world. We need him.”
NO.
This time, the word stabbed through Hump’s soul, cold as ice. Hump stumbled, but he did not back down. He could sense Glyndaril’s grief beyond the anger. He knew what it was to feel this way.
And he knew what it was he’d sought.
Answers. Revenge. Closure.
But that was not the purpose of the Book of Infinite Pages—not anymore. He remembered the words written in the book from Samuel Durain. The true purpose revealed to him once the restrictions were removed.
“You were made into the Book of Infinite Pages with revenge in mind,” Hump said. “But that is not what the First Master truly wanted. In his own words, it left him a shadow of himself. He wanted you to be more than that. He entrusted you, his greatest friend, to be there when the shackles of the Pantheon are broken and return the knowledge to humanity that has been stolen from them. The book was born of war, but what the first master truly wants is for us to guide those that seek knowledge, and to free those oppressed by those that would be gods.
“That time is now. The Path to Heaven is open, and Loften is no ally of the Pantheon any longer. Now is our chance to fulfil his wish. To bring about this world he envisioned. Loften must be freed if we are to reach the Path to Heaven and save Alveron. Not just Alveron, but our world. I ask you, Glyndaril, help me as you once helped the First Master all those years ago. Help me breach the door.”
There was a long pause. Hump sensed Glyndaril’s rage rescind and the pressure on his soul disappear. He stood there, breathing deeply, waiting for the owl to make his decision. In truth, Hump wasn’t even sure how much of what he’d just said he believed anyway. He was not one for such ideals. The idea that he might usher in a new age after the Pantheon seemed as ludicrous as it was arrogant, but for it to come to mind like it had at least a part of him had to see it was possible. Or perhaps he just wanted it to be true.
Finally, Glyndaril moved. With graceful elegance, he lowed his head in a deep nod and closed his eyes. The world of blue vanished, and Hump was once more in the dim cavern of the hydra. The Book of Infinite Pages opened in his lap to two blank pages.
“How did it go?” Celaine asked.
Hump smiled, watching as a formation as complex as the door emerging in essence-made ink. He stood and made his way toward the doors, his book in one hand. Standing before it, he imbued it with essence, giving Glyndaril all the power he might need. He sensed the owl at work within, controlling his essence. In a surge of light, it met the door. The golden channels shone with light, a thousands runes glowed, and the arcane gears began to shift.
Stone groaned like a mountain shifting, deep and resonant. Dust cascaded in streams as ancient mechanisms stirred, the arcane clockwork gears clicking as they turned. The colossal door cracked apart at the centre, and with a low, reverberating hum, it began to slide open. No hinges. Just a smooth, fluid motion as the doors were absorbed into the walls on either side.
Light poured out through the widening gap. Not the soft glow of essence lamps, but something brighter and far, far more powerful. Hump’s breath caught as the air shifted, heavy with divinity. A storm of essence rolled over them, enough to make his skin prickle and a stark change compared to the emptiness of the place they had left behind.
And then the door was fully open.
They stepped through in silence, standing in the doorway as if they each feared the doors might shut behind them. The chamber beyond was massive—a grand as any temple of the Pantheon in scale. It was no longer stone beneath their boots, but polished tiles of pale turquoise and deep emerald, veined with gold. The walls shimmered with intricate runes etched in runes that Hump couldn’t read, but he recognised as God Glyphs. They glowed faintly like starlight against polished gold.
And at the centre of it all hovered a swirling sphere of light—bronze, scarlet, and silver, all mixed into one, almost blindingly bright and frozen like the sun in mid-explosion, so large it filled most of the grand chamber. It pulsed with raw divinity, and it was a divinity that Hump recognised—Loften.
Four towering pillars surrounded it, spaced out evenly in a square. Monoliths carved from impossibly smooth stone, each veined with colour that bled from an essence source within—flame, ice, silver, and gold. From each pillar extended great chains that arched into the surging light at the centre.
Bud fell to his knees, gazing into the light. Hump almost wanted to do the same. He felt like he was before a God Pillar—no, something greater. This divinity was beyond anything he’d seen. It was like he was peering into the very heart of a god.
It was then that Hump realised what it looked like. This wasn’t just any energy. It was a soul. Or something similar, like Soul Manifestation.
Then came a laugh. Low at first, then rolling, echoing from nowhere and everywhere at once. It grew, wild and unbound, filled with manic joy that sent shivers through Hump’s spine.
“So you have come,” the voice said.
Hump’s heart leapt with recognition. “Loften?”
“Who else would you find in here? I had hoped that you might succeed, but in all honestly. “Another bark of laughter. “I did not truly believe it would come to pass. And yet, here you are, Bearer of Infinity.”