Chapter 46: Daydreaming is Easy, Acting is Difficult

Welcome to another edition of the Aengus Nowak podcast, brought to you from my new home studio in Dublin, Ireland. I hope you enjoy the better sound quality and remember to like, subscribe and share.

Today, I’m delighted to welcome none other than Lord Azanth, newly restored chief lord of the Seventh Plane of Wickedness and I must say Lord Azanth is looking remarkably suave in a tuxedo. Much the best-dressed guest I’ve ever had on the podcast. Lord Azanth, you are very welcome.

Every day we should hear at least one song, read one good poem, view an exquisite painting and, if not on the battlefield, dress in fine clothing. It is a pleasure to be here on your podcast, and once more on the Plane of Life. A plane that is a rich source of human souls and from which my enemies tried to block me forever.

Let’s go easy on the human souls shall we? Or we’ll think Earl Clarence had a point. Now, last time you were on the podcast you were a crisp, I suppose the first question we all want to know is how did you get your handsome demon form back?

Not even the mildest hint of torture was needed. All of the mages responsible for that transference hastened to abase themselves before me and offer restitution.

Did you have any hesitation about leaving your crisp body? I mean, obviously, it’s a serious restraint to be confined to a crisp. But it has a certain charm. I got used to you being a crisp and it’s still hard to appreciate that this powerful demon form in the studio with me is Lord Azanth.

Beauty is a manifestation of inner truth. You see me now as beautiful because this is my true form. The crisp was a lie and I had no regrets in abandoning it.

Do you still have the stats and skills of a prawn cocktail crisp Adventurer? Or did they reset with your return to a demon body?

I still have these skills and as I continue my journey back to Level One Hundred, I believe they will become uniquely powerful. Here, let me remind you of your favourite buff.

Oh, that’s bussin’. Listeners. It’s hard to describe the effect of the skill Lord Azanth just used but it is called Rush of a Prawn Cocktail Crisp and it really is a rush. It also fills your mouth with the distinct flavour of a prawn cocktail crisp. I want to get up, run outside and start punching lampposts! Not to mention eat a bag of crisps. That’s some buff.

Indeed. Although I regret losing my old build, which could stop a tank, as a leader of raid parties there is a lot to recommend my choice to create a support build from the skills available to the prawn cocktail crisp class.

Right. I can certainly vouch for that. I suppose Telepathy might be one skill that is less useful to you now. Would you swap it if you could?

That is an interesting question. Let me weigh the scales on either side. The other initial choices for me as a crisp were assess magic; create scent; disguise; fast reflexes; heal fracture; invisibility; levitate; poison cloud; slice; stealth; and summon small animal. None of these are particularly valuable for a leader of raids and armies, invisibility perhaps would be my choice. To move unseen through your enemies or to disappear when they are trying to target you could be a decisive tactic in battle.

To consider the other side of the scale, though, Telepathy continues to be the skill that I use the most in my daily affairs. Everyone dissembles. But people are less practiced at hiding their thoughts than they are at wearing a false expression and speaking lies. Moreover, there is the value of Telepathy for giving orders in the confusing sonic landscape of the battlefield.

Oh, right. You remember that battle with the sharks in the underwater pirate’s chamber? That was totally confusing. All darkness and teeth. It was crazy. And there was no way of talking to each other. We would not have managed to save our mana without you co-ordinating us. Even with your Telepathy I thought we were going to wipe.

A memorable victory indeed. And an important step towards my goal of revenge.

Let’s go back to that. You took a chance and headed back to the Seventh Plane of Wickedness to raise the banner of revenge. Yet you had no vassals, no troops. What happened?

Ever since being overthrown, my waking dreams were of returning to power and crushing those who had betrayed me. Daydreaming, however, is easy, acting is difficult and to put one's thoughts into action is the hardest thing in the world. Though filled with trepidation at the prospect of attempting to regain my castles while only Level Twenty-Three, my Chief of Spies, that most admirable and loyal of servants, assured me that such alienation and contempt existed towards Lady Liseth for having set loose titans that it would be possible to break apart the alliance that had brought her to power.

I remember being worried for you after you left us. It felt strangely quiet too. Not that you were a constant talker, it’s just I missed you like I’d miss my phone I guess. I felt cut off from something. Hah that sounds terrible, but if you knew how much I was on my phone you’d realise it was a compliment. Anyway, you took the risk – your own version of crossing the Rubicon - and it paid off.

Never in the history of the Seventh Plane of Wickedness was a campaign crowned with success so swiftly. The story of my return deserves an entire book by Homer. Divide and rule is the age-old motto of princes, and it was the core of my strategy. We began at the Castle of Silver Tears, whose warden was one of the few demons to have remained faithful to me at the time of my fall. Once my return was known, some lords rallied to me, others took up arms against me. The majority watched cautiously. And the brief version for your podcast is that once the Duke of Waking Nightmares declared for me, dozens of lickspittle, fair-weather, self-serving lords realised that my comeback was underway and left the cause of Lady Liseth for mine.

And at this time you were still a prawn cocktail crisp?

I was.

What was that like? Difficult, I imagine.

Difficult, aye. But recall that having only recently respawned, Lady Liseth was merely Level Three. She may have had a body more acceptable for the rituals of lordship and homage than that of a crisp, but she lacked authority. At least I was able to contribute to the events on the battlefield. My Rush of a Prawn Cocktail Crisp skill especially proved its worth.

I can see it would be an important battlefield or raid buff. Especially for the melee classes.

Indeed. Haste, Strength and Physical Attack all increase, most useful to a fighter or monk. What gives the skill particular value is that it applies to everyone in the area of effect. Thus, I was able to enhance the effectiveness of all of my troops. Granted, for the higher-level soldiers the benefits were minor, yet scaled across hundreds, it was a genuine contribution.

Terrific. And when we think about the other side of the battlefield, I can’t imagine Lady Liseth making the slightest difference. Were there any particularly notable battles? Our news didn’t really keep up with what was happening on your plane. I mean, some of the accounts I follow on X were posting about it but they tended to show click bait duels rather than give an overall sense of what was happening. You know the kind of thing: ‘Mage Level Seventy duels Rogue Level Sixty-Five. You’ll never believe what happened.’

The most important battle took place on the third day of my comeback. Four lords who had taken the side of Lady Liseth and three of whom knew I could never forgive them (the fourth being my cousin) rushed to besiege the Castle of Silver Tears. We decided to intercept them rather than become confined to our walls and our ambush was so unexpected that we caught their advanced guard and destroyed it before the rest of their army could arrive. Then we turned on their main body and although closely matched, momentum was with us and once my cousin betrayed Lady Liseth we obtained their surrender.

With my foothold in the realm secured, every day saw a messenger arriving from one of the lords of the realm, pledging support to my cause.

Awesome. Knowing you as I do, I think a lot of that is down to your character. I always felt that you treated me with respect in our group. Even though you’d been a Level One Hundred mage and lord of one of the planes. And I was just a human teenager, fresh out of school and still learning the basics.

You are an admirably brave and quick-thinking young human. It was a pleasure to group with you. And I must correct your assessment. Mostly, the minor lords of the Seventh Plane of Wickedness dislike me and resent being my vassals. It was not my character that brought them to me again but a most tangible recoiling away from Lady Liseth. To unleash a titan, let alone three of them, was to imperil us all. Such utter folly drove the other demons back to my cause.

I can imagine. Well, I’m glad you are back in your old castle and I’m proud to know the chief lord of the Seventh Plane of Wickedness. But let’s turn to the titans. You and Mithelasin seem to have formed an effective team as raid leaders. I’m sure thousands of my listeners watched the battle with Nuska. How did that look from your perspective?

Nothing is more terrible than to see ignorance in action. Learning from the failure of Earl Clarence and Lady Liseth, our scholars searched the fifteen planes for tales of Nuska and our highest-level scouts kept discreet watch on her and brought back knowledge of her skills. Doubt grows with knowledge. We understood that our plans must be based on contingency, not certainty.

Our strategy, as you saw, was to distribute the high-level Adventurers among three corps. For some, wisdom goes no deeper than multiplication. More is stronger. Mass your raid in one large force and charge. Yet what if your forces are more like a complex number than an integer? Then multiplication produces surprising negatives. Or let me speak more plainly: we struck a balance between flexibility and strength and, importantly, separated those whose skills overlapped and would have led to redundancy if grouped.

Buffed to the greatest extent with fire resistant skills, Mithelasin flew in and the battle began in an open field, close to the hilltop that was our ideal location. All went as expected at first. Nuska fought with molten fists, with her Flurry of Blows skill on a timer of eight seconds. For that we had paladins standing ready to Lay on Hands and compensate for the sudden loss of Mithelasin’s hit points. Nuska was radiating fire damage and had a ten-second Flare debuff skill, which we dealt with by rotating out the groups so they could heal and rebuff.

Our difficulty at this stage, as your listeners would have observed, was that an unanticipated Knockback skill was throwing Mithelasin out of aggro range and allowing Nuska to swap targets. In this way she killed a dozen DPS-class raiders who had come close to flank her and the success of the raid was most definitely in jeopardy before we’d even got her down to half her hit points. The true genius of that moment was a human druid, Togad Mac Murrough, who on his own initiative raised a Wall of Stone behind Mithelasin. This allowed the angel to brace himself against the knockbacks. For his quick thinking, we gave the druid the first pick of the loot drops.

The titan’s hit points fell to fifty percent; then came the Fireballs of Nuska. Our studies had prepared us for these and as soon as the red spheres engulfed each member of the raid, we scattered, so that no two overlapped. Their detonation after six seconds was troublesome, but nothing like the reinforced fireballs we had read about, should the raid fail to spread them out.

Regrouped once more, we were prepared for Nuska’s dragon form at twenty-five percent hit points and our DPS pulled back away from the devastating tail swipes that all accounts agreed could not be withstood. No dragon fight is easy and a titan in dragon form is a most ferocious creature. Nevertheless, the tactics for such fights are well understood. Buff constantly with resistance to the breath weapon – in this case fire – and keep a reserve of healers to come in after the blast, enough to take over the rotation on the tank and raise those who were downed.

In this way we defeated the titan and when she was unconscious, did not slay her of course, since she would only respawn, but carried her to be rebound once more.

Honestly, it was the best raid I’ve ever seen. I just wish I could have joined in. But I was too low level. Her AE would have melted me before I’d landed one blow. Fair play to you and to Mithelasin. Now after that raid, you had to take on Chronos. I was there at the Hostelry of Eternal Darkness when Earl Clarence and Lady Liseth released Chronos. And we experienced some weird time looping. How did you manage that in the raid?

You have recalled our experiences of a time when I was but Level Seven and these memories prompt me to visit the Second Butler again, now I am restored and so is the hostelry. My title of ‘Member of the Purple Order’ is one that I bear with pride. I will journey there soon.

It is my belief that Time is a strange thing. It is a whimsical tyrant, which in every heartbeat has a different face for all that one says and does. Because we attended to every detail of our raid and treated each heartbeat as the only moment, we were able to bind Chronos. Strangely, in my memory, he was in chains even before the battle was concluded.

Oh, that’s interesting. Perhaps it's a bit like jumping to another branch of the multiverse but not knowing we’ve done that after the fact. In any case, congratulations. You’ve become the hero of the fifteen planes that Earl Clarence wanted to be.

We’re coming to the end of the show, and I have one last question which perhaps is a bit selfish. But I’m interested to know if you learned anything from being a crisp and grouping with Liam, Kate and myself?

All truly wise thoughts have been thought already thousands of times; but to make them truly ours, we must think them over again honestly, until they take root in our personal experience. Thus, I have learned a great deal that I already knew but did not understand. Such as that if you treat humans as if they were what they ought to be, you help them to become what they are capable of being. And also, that the greatest thing in this world is not so much where we stand as in what direction we are moving.

And on that positive note, we’ll finish up. Thank you very much to Lord Azanth my guest. I’m proud of the fact that for a part of your journey I was your comrade.

As I am proud to have been part of yours.

***

And that’s the end!

Thanks

Poko

for the suggestion I fill out the events more thoroughly than in the original version, where this ending came at Chapter 43. I hope that those extra three chapters brought you a more satisfying finish to the story.

Please stay subscribed for the next story, which I’ll begin soon. I’m scrawling down ideas in a notebook, but here’s the gist:

Omnipotent Dreams. Cyn Sweetwater is a surrealist artist, in trouble with the law and forced to wear an experimental headset that allows advertising in her dreams. Neo 'the edge' is the techbro behind the dream advertising and he has a hidden agenda, to influence the user's politics and get his neo-fascist friends into power across the world. The battle for Cyn's future is a battle of dreams. And there's a third party invested in the outcome: a being in her unconscious, someone who considers this new arrival an existential threat. It turns out that all sentient creatures have symbiots living in their unconscious and that it's not a good idea to make them feel threatened...