Page 4077 -- CCCXXV.

Too much to remember at once, even for him. Countless crimes and crises. Tragedies and faces. Smiling, then agonizing.

Eadric. Cynebald. Aelred. Eadmund. Wynnstan.

Cut in two. Burning alive. Strangled. Skull caved in. Decapitated.

Cenhelm. Leofcild. Hilda. Tata. Cuthberht. Wulfric.

Drowning. Starving. Bleeding out. Buried alive. Stabbed through the neck. Dead in his arms.

Bada. Cenric. Jonathan. Richard. Nina. Martha.

Endless.

Endless.

Endless.

The thought processes were spiraling away from him. He felt them. Going off in different directions. Trying to recall. Trying to see. Memories and the world at once. Trying to address as much as possible. To assess everything. Melancholy be damned.

He contained himself. Pulled everything back. Too dangerous. Too much.

Tenebrach was saying something. Of course he was. Warning him again. And he was replying, too. Reassuring. Everything was fine.

Tenebrach would know it was a lie, but that didn't matter.

Few things did, anymore.

Focus on them. Concentrate. For a bit longer.

Ugh.

Horrible though they could be, the higher realms did offer a strange kind of solace. Since there was so much to worry about in them, so many potential threats, it was somehow easier to not get lost like this.

Here, things were too calm. Too safe. Too quiet.

But that was just a trick of perception, wasn't it? A bias. There was plenty of madness to subdue here, too. He was just too comfortable in his home realm. The familiarity was the problem.

Meditation would help.

There wasn't time. There never was.

No. There always was. Assign the thought processes to them. Stand them by. Calm them down. Calm everything down.

Relax.

Just relax.

Sermung breathed.

He concentrated, and he breathed.


Chapter Three Hundred Twenty-Five: 'The city of the Heart...'
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Andeyal was something else. Hector had always known about it. Seen pictures and video. It was one of the most famous cities in the world, after all.

But man.

Just being here made Atreya feel smaller, somehow. The buildings were absolutely gargantuan. The term "skyscraper" barely seemed like enough to describe them. There were entire roadways up there, too, weaving in between them, apparently connecting to many of those buildings directly. How bad must traffic have gotten in this place for roads like those to be deemed necessary?

More and more, he was starting to understand how that huge area underground could have been left abandoned for so long. With so much going on out here--and up there--did these people ever bother to look down, anymore?