Chapter 18
I had Unholy Smite and my absurd stats.
Solara had Demons of the Storm and any other Bolt spell she pleased.
Podni had her spell bombs based on the strength of Solara's Bolt spell.
Purity buffed us so our overpowered attacks were even stronger.
And Invia had my Unholy Smite as well as a swarm of Silk Swords. Every sword had a red-hot blade enchanted with Slow, Ghostly Feint+5, and Sharpen+27.
I highlight these advantages so you believe me when I say levels 31 to 40 were dull for our party. We walked through them in 12 days and came away with roughly 1.2 million XP a piece, which was abysmal compared to the XP our boss rush teleporter chain could net us, but it was progress.
This set of floors was based on character classes. Floor 31, for example, was all humanoid monsters–from orcs to lizardmen–with the barbarian class. Every single mob.
The floor after that was rangers. Then fighters, wizards, monks, and rogues.
Levels 37 through 39 made me glad I had waited to grant any of my party undeath. Whole floors of clerics, priests, and paladins could have been deadly if any enemy got a Holy spell off.
Acquiring the liquid sunlight I needed for more Immunity to Holy potions was a must, and those floors only made that belief stronger.
The final floor didn't have a singular boss. We fought an entire party–one enemy per class–of human-adjacent monsters. They looked, moved, and fought like humans but didn't have faces.
They died like humans too. All of these battles were instant thrashings, so I don't even have fights to describe, just annihilations.
Unfortunately, we had other work to tend to, so we hung a silk noose, grabbed our boss loot, and warped home.
I should have enjoyed this run, but Aurketzu never stopped whispering to me.
“Abaddon is coming for you, viceroy. You will wish for death.”
The moment I felt happiness, her words struck. Every time.
I was in the rectory poring over the tome Solara had been reading, trying to solidify a plan for eliminating Abaddon, when I received a system notification.
A summoner on the plane of dominions invites you for an audience. You cannot receive or deliver harm for as long as you remain within the summoning circle, and you may return to your home plane at will. These rules cannot be broken or cheated by either party.
Do you accept the invitation?
Yes / No
The plane of dominions was one of the celestial planes.
Thus far, all of my celestial summonings had targeted the plane of the angeli, the lowest of the heavenly planes, and the beings I summoned were fallen angeli, or grigori, as beings like Cici were known.
If I succeeded in climbing the tower to break into the heavens, the angeli plane was where I would find myself.
From there, I would have to travel another 8 planes to reach the top of the celestial power structure, progressing in this order from least to greatest:
? Plane of Angeli
? Plane of the Archangeli
? Plane of Principalities
? Plane of Powers
? Plane of Virtues
? Plane of Dominions
? Plane of Thrones
? Plane of the Cherubim
? Plane of the Seraphim
The summoner requesting my presence was from the plane of dominions, three away from the plane of the seraphim, where the strongest celestials lived.
From watching Solara draw so many summoning circles, I also knew that targeting one specific individual for a summon was vastly more complicated and expensive than summoning a random being of a certain type.
Furthermore, the more distant a plane was from the summoner further increased the spell’s difficulty.
As a resident of the dominions plane, my summoner was on the upper end of celestial influence, but their not being the most powerful made me more willing to take the risk of accepting.
A seraphim had nothing to gain by speaking with me.
If they were interested in Byron of Zaglis, that could only be because they felt threatened.
The creatures on that plane were presumably strong enough to repel Abaddon.
If they saw me as a threat, killing me would be the easiest and simplest solution.
A conversation wasn’t even worth a thought.
But a summoner from a lower celestial plane was more likely to have aspirations of climbing higher. To reach the plane of dominions, this celestial had already demonstrated a high degree of competency, and why would they want to stop? I could be incredibly useful to a being like that.
That didn’t guarantee my safety by any means, but I thrived whenever greed was involved. Enemy or ally, the thirst for more made them vulnerable.
I selected Yes.
I found myself standing at the very top of a white tower.
The sky was filled with strange stars and colorful moons, and all around me were islands suspended in the darkness, as if the most beautiful parts of Earth had been divided into puzzle pieces and hung by strings.
I felt no wind or temperature in this place, but the scent of blooming flowers was almost overwhelming.
A humanoid rivaling the scale of the giantess Spirit of Death stood before me.
The muscular male form gleamed like solid gold and had six arms and two primary sets of wings.
The wings were a silky silver, one pair mounted on his shoulder blades like Cici’s stumps and the other attached to his lower back and tailbone.
Each of his ankles had a single smaller wing sticking straight out, reminding me of rudders on a ship.
His hair was the same gold as his body, but his eyes were a shimmering platinum instead of the golden eyes I was used to seeing on grigori.
Should I risk Sense Weakness on him? No, starting on bad terms would be disastrous, considering the strength of my host.
“Thank you for accepting my invitation,” the angel boomed. “I wish to discuss a business proposition.”
Interesting.
“So you summoned me specifically?” I asked to confirm my earlier suspicion.
“Indeed.”
“Then I fear I am at a disadvantage. You know who I am, but I don’t know who you are.”
“I am Arcturus, merchant to the heavens. I have learned of your products escaping the material plane.”
“I do not mean to be disrespectful with my caution,” I said, “but do you consider me your enemy?”
“That may be true of some of my kind, but I am my own person with my own interests. I searched for evidence that you harmed celestials, and I didn’t even find rumors of such.”
“That’s true. I haven’t harmed anyone from the heavens.”
Not for lack of trying.
“Then you are no enemy. You can kill as many of your kind as you like. You are a lesser being from a lesser plane harming other lesser beings. Though you are lesser, that does not mean we cannot profit together.”
Lesser being. Lesser plane. I hoped I had the chance to kill Arcturus when his usefulness ran out.
“I will hear your proposal,” I said.
“I wish to be your exclusive distributor to the heavens. You cease sending samples through grigori and sell to me instead. I suspect you hoped your efforts would lead to an opportunity like this one, and I am happy to open the door for you. Have I read the situation correctly?”
I nodded.
“How much gold do you require to agree to my terms?”
“I would prefer a trade,” I answered. “I seek 5 doses of liquid sunlight. Once I’ve acquired those, I’d rather be paid in a resource unique to the heavens, something I couldn’t find on the material plane.”
“What need does a human have for liquid sunlight?”
“I’m not sure you could afford the price I would charge to share that information.”
“You are shrewd indeed. Provide me guidance on what would interest you so that I may make a compelling offer.”
“I desire knowledge of the hells. I am particularly interested in histories of conflicts with the material and celestial planes, as well as beings from the abyssal plane. When that has been exhausted, we can agree on a gold amount for ongoing business.”
Arcturus stilled as he thought. No part of him moved save for the slow rise and fall of his folded wings.
Reading a celestial’s facial expressions was difficult for me.
Their eyes, lacking irises and pupils, seemed especially empty when I had spent a lifetime speaking only with humans.
My impression was that he wanted to know why I was so interested in the hells, but he also knew better than to ask.
Or he was trying to intimidate me. I couldn’t decide.
“And these terms give me exclusivity,” he said after a time. “You would no longer send product to my planes through other means.”
“Reaching new customers with my products is important to me. If you aren't hoarding the merchandise and are actively promoting it, I would have no desire to send product any other way. I value the simplicity of a motivated distributor.”
“I am surprised a human of your nature has come to this decision so easily.”
“I do have questions if we are to be business partners,” I said, deflecting the hard sell. “Is doing business with the material plane common?”
“I wouldn't use that word, but such business happens more often than most humans would believe.”
“For what sort of items, and how does the exchange work?”
“I have humans at my disposal to facilitate these sorts of transactions, which is how our trades would work as well. Goods can vary. A few foods, a selection of wines, and a substance called dreamdust, which I understand to be popular in your world.”
I held back my laughter. If Arcturus knew I was connected to Samson, he didn't say so, and I couldn't tell if he was hiding that knowledge or not.
His face didn't move enough when he spoke, and I didn't know if that was normal for whatever species of ascended angeli he was.
I also knew better than to ask him anything about it.
“I'm familiar with dreamdust,” I said.
“I had heard it was popular, yes.”
“Does doing business between planes make me new enemies I should be aware of?”
“No more than is typical. My enemies would view any of my associates unfavorably, just as your enemies would do the same for your associates.”
“Fair.”