"Wait a minute..." Ares almost couldn't believe he'd missed something so unnatural. This whole time he should have already been at the tenth stage of sensory enhancement! The tribulation he'd summoned back at the tryouts should have been a result of his ascension to the tenth stage, he even thought as such at the time, but then not even a few minutes later he forgot about it, the cultivation base hadn't moved from where it was prior, and he treated it as though everything was perfectly normal! He'd gone from ninth stage of sensory enhancement to tenth stage 'twice'! His first thought was that maybe Garmr expending his life force had a knock on effect and reset his cultivation but Ares didn't believe it. His cultivation was already at ninth stage still before that even happened!
Ares groaned and held his head as his memories of the past corrected itself, oddities and misaligned truths became clear, and he was left clueless about what caused any of this. It felt like someone orchestrated one massive illusion and he, along with everyone else, simply played right into it... But what a strange method of tricking someone, making them believe they'd cultivated up a stage... And what for? Something inexplicable had happened here... Ares double checked himself and, this time, for real, he was absolutely at the tenth stage of sensory enhancement. There was no anomalies about it and he was dead certain without a shadow of a doubt... But he was left confused and curious about what exactly transpired back at the tryouts. This wasn't a small issue. Who, or what, ever responsible not only had the ability to make Ares believe he'd cultivated an entire stage but also the ability to put multiple people under that illusion, and summon a fake golden tribulation, without anybody else noticing! Even Finnian and Mimi didn't question it! And for what purpose exactly?! This was an oddly strange prank to pull just for the fun of it as the lengths the person or thing responsible would have to go to in order to pull this many strings was a hassle to say the least. Even more worrying was the fact that Ares only justnow realised something was amiss so had his brain been swamped in invasive mental magic up until now as well? Regardless of how this happened, it was a wake up call that the world out here was dangerous, extremely so. He wasn't really prepared for this place, not yet. The sooner he could get back to Sheryashka and pick up the Moongate Mountain, to offer him greater mental protection and prevent trickery like this, the better. Rather, the sooner he could leave this place and return inside the barrier, to get the hell away from whatever was messing with him out here, the happier he'd be and safer he'd feel.
Sigh
The sound of an exasperated Dominus rang through Ares' skull and practically drowned him in second hand resignation and frustration. Kid, check your pocket. I think I know what happened to you... If I'm right, you've got a real nuisance of a problem on your hands and it would be best to leave this place as soon as possible to avoid dealing with them further... Was Ares about to get an answer to this perplexing state of affairs? He really wanted one so he listened to Dominus' timely advice and scoured around his clothes for anything that wasn't supposed to be there. Eventually Ares found a letter, crumpled up with chew marks all around the edges. Fuck me that damn menace really is still going at it?! How many years has she been doing this!? Ah whatever, she's your problem now Ares. Best of luck, don't ask me to help you because I can't.
Dominus couldn't provide assistance? That was deeply concerning. Usually he'd have some kind of method up his sleeve to deal with whatever problem Ares was involved with, even if Ares didn't always rely on him, so to finally hear him say there was something beyond him and his capabilities lurking about was unnerving. Worse still, it sounded like this was another situation he'd personally lived through and experienced, like Charon, so the fact he hadn't already dealt with this issue, while he was at full strength, meant Ares was pretty boned if he hung around here and came face to face with the perpetrator of this whole mess... Still, he checked the letter anyway and piece by piece unfolded it to reveal the contents within. He unravelled the creases and discovered the first line which stated, pure and simply, 'Dido is top dog! All others are mutts!'
...
What? Ares, unsure of the intent behind this message, even though it was arguably very obvious, went searching for the next sentence hidden within the folds of the scrunched letter to find any sort of clarifier...
'Dido thinks you're stupid!'
...
Dominus... An explanation please... Ares' eye twitched as he suddenly felt the weight of danger lift and the weight of mockery intensify. Apparently his life wasn't at risk, his pride was!
Dido... There was a slight pause before Dominus continued, as if he was unsure how best to explain this complicated individual... Although the problem was actually the exact opposite, they were so unbelievably simple, in terms of motivation and goals, that they were debatably more confusing this way. When asking someone why they did something, a person who rambled on for days on end would be hard to understand, yes, but the person who didn't give a reason, as though their actions were an innate, unstoppable drive would be way harder to comprehend. Dido was such an existence.
Dido is a space-pup. A spacian dog that's been alive perhaps erven longer than I have. if certain rumours are to be believed she might even be the first ever spacian though good luck getting a straight answer from her about it... Anyway, There's not really much to say, she's just annoying. She annoys people, that is quite literally her shtick. And yes, before you ask, she always speaks in third person. Don't ask me why, I have no idea.
Dido is extremely powerful and comes and goes like the wind. More often than not you won't even realise she was bothering you until everything is said and done. The only way to tell if she's around is to pay attention to any and all magic to see if you can spot a faint blue glow that isn't natural; that's her tell and you should get used to keeping an eye out for it. She likes to mess with people by summoning highly inconvenient magic that blends in with whatever situation you're currently in. Like, for instance, if you're fighting a fire cultivator who throws multiple Fireballs at you, Dido might intervene and double the amount o Fireballs from behind the scenes. The cultivator who threw it might just believe they're on the top of their game but if you see a blue glow, hidden somewhere in the volley of flames, then you know Dido is toying with you. She once dropped a meteor on me when I was in a highly dangerous spatial zone with rampant anomalies and I originally thought nothing of it. It was just that kind of environment. After the fifth meteor, however, I eventually managed to catch a glimpse of that damn grinning mutt's blue glow. Her laughter is like the whispers of a spectre and she disappears in the blink of an eye even if you can spot her wherever she's hiding. That's essentially her shtick and gimmick; she makes your life harder with extremely wide ranging and versatile magic and then runs away when you try to track her down. I've chased and even confronted her a few times but her magic is inexhaustible, seemingly endless, and she's obnoxiously powerful on top of that. I hate to admit it but she might even be a tiny bit stronger than I am... Which is saying something 'cos I was nearly invincible you know?! She's more of a legend than anything, a devilish prankster with infamy galore...
Ares appreciated the explanation but there were definitely a few sections to this story that were missing! Ok, first of all, she had the power to make someone, me in this instance, believe they've cultivated an entire stage above their current base? There's a limiter on this domain, you know! That level of power, while restricted, is absurd and I don't buy it! Also, second of all, why is she bothering me? Is this random or is there more to it? Also, most importantly, is she still here? Though Ares had myriad more questions, and would very much like myriad more truths, he would at least accept answers to these specific queries as they were the most pressing right now.
Mimi's magic is as boundless as Veteran's. Nobody knows how many pillar affiliations she has but it's a lot, like a lot a lot, as the ways she can prank people, and the magic she uses to do it, is immense. Don't think of someone like Mimi as a certified prankster, not before the likes of Dido anyway. Now that I think about it, it's even possible that Dido, at some point, was the 'real' Alice in disguise which would explain how it got so close to us at the tryouts. If it got to the real Alice before Mimi did then pretending to stuff its face with scones, while it watched from above, and messed with you here and there, is entirely plausible. Basically 'Alice' was replaced twice. Dido put her in stasis somewhere, Mimi asked Dido to become her for a while, and then you finally met the twice replaced Alice... As for why she bothered, and to answer your second question of 'why you were targeted'...
Speaking in third person isn't Dido's only quirk... She has one more which is going to cause you a lot of headaches, much the same way it did me when I was still alive and kicking.
Normally Dido only pranks a person of interest once or twice and leaves once she's gotten her fill, she gets bored easily and likes to annoy new people who give her new reactions to pass the time... But when she spots another 'dog' it's war. Gametime, crunch time, show time, whatever you wanna call it. As soon as Dido spots another 'dog' she gets extremely competitive. It's on. You saw the letter right? 'Dido is top dog'? She views every other dog-type racial existence, K9s and revenants primarily, as utterly inferior and hates them all. She views us an affront to her supreme existence because she wants to remain... Well, 'top dog'. That's literally it. That's her entire character. no other validation or rhyme or reason for her beliefs, she hates dog-type races with a passion and will not hesitate to spend excess time stomping down on those weaker than her to keep them down and out.
Dido once followed a K9 throughout their entire cultivation journey, which ultimately lasted over a million years, just because she wanted to make the up and coming 'prodigy' fall at every hurdle and struggle. In secret, she made every single encounter thrice as hard, making animals go berserk, trapping the K9 in seemingly endless mirages, summing extra little bits of magic as he faced off against powerful foes. You name it, she did it. All because he was 'talented' and posed an insignificant threat to her prestige as 'top dog'. Naturally, then, you can imagine how much she hated me, an immortal, ageless, domineering, and perfect-in-every-way revenant..." Ares ignored the narcissism, it was basically Dominus' go-to trait and he was surprised it had taken this long to surface, and let him continue speaking. "... I think, as far as 'dogs' go, I was the biggest threat she'd ever seen up until that point; I was a God candidate and for the highly contested weapons pillar too. You have no idea how many millions of years I put up with that damn mongrel and, actually, she never really left me alone. The harassment only 'stopped' when I died and got trapped inside you. Either she's here to bother me again, because she's heard the rumours about me being bound inside you and tracked us down, or she's here... For you... You've got a lot more innate talents than I do so you might be her new scratching post and chew toy. I would hope not for your sake, she'll drive you up the wall in due time, but those letters practically all but confirm it. Maybe you can hide inside the barrier for now but, when you get out, expect Dido to be a constant thorn in your side. She'll never directly kill you, that's not how she operates, but you'll be damn sure wishing you could kill her by the time you finally catch her in the act and realise just how much she's been manipulating you and your struggles.
As for you last question, whether she's still around and lurking even now... I don't know. Maybe you can spot her with Omniscience? But I'm sure she's keeping an eye out for it so don't be overly reliant on it. Yes there's a limiter on this domain but a being as powerful, and long lived, as her will probably have a method to circumvent it entirely. She probably knows the limiter rune greater than the person who invented it so don't expect something so inconsequential to stop her in her tracks. Her mastery over countless pillars is annoyingly thorough so there really isn't any proper solution to keeping her at bay. You sort of just have to deal with Dido's insufferable nature, overcome whatever trials and labours she dumps on you, and hope she goes away to pick on someone else. That or you can keep an eye out for glowing blues signs of her interreference and try to confront her face to face... Take it from someone's who's tried, though, she'll just barrage you with endless magic and run away though so good luck stopping her with force...
If I were you, I'd just head back into Isaz and hope she forgets about you by the time the barrier is down for good. Probably not, Garmr is going to tick her off until the heat death of the universe and make her real competitive as she'll feel like her spot as 'top dog' is in jeopardy, but maybe you'll have some years of peace and quiet ahead of you if you lie low for a while inside the barrier. She shouldn't be able to follow you inside... I think... Either way, there's nothing left for you out here... Unless you want to get messed with even more than you already were. Leaving now is wise. You've finally reached the tenth stage, properly this time, so accepting the fact that she got you good and moving on will spare you a lot of headaches instead of trying to get revenge.
Ares kissed his teeth and unfolded the last bit of paper even though he a rough idea what sort of words were going to be written messily on it, scrawled all over the page. Perhaps Dido had stuck a pen between her teeth in order to write these demeaning comments hence the unsightly and wriggly handwriting which only made Ares feel even more insulted. 'You think you're a better dog just because you're bigger than Dido? Dido will show you, stupid mutt!'
Yep, she definitely hated Ares because of Garmr, that much was confirmed at least.... Though knowing as such didn't exactly alleviate any of Ares' woes. Still, his life wasn't at risk, at least not in any direct way, so that was somewhat of a relief. Dido was a problem for future Ares!... Along with all the other problems he was gong to have deal with. The cult of destruction, Dido, Ject, dragons, other jealous Gods, etc... There were a lot of feuds in store for him but at least things were relatively calm on the enemy front inside the barrier. There was the Torchbearer... And that was about it actually. The Frozen Throne weren't concerning enough to warrant a spot on his list so Ares just ignored them. For the most part, his opposition in Sheryashka had been monstrous in form and not human. There were definitely scumbags he'd encountered, they were a dime a dozen in the cultivation world so that was no shocker, but actual persistent threats to him or his family? Ares was lucky not to come across such people as of yet. There was the Chen clan but they were turned into dust and went down without even swinging really. Sentient, non-creature foes were apparently not easy to come by for someone of Ares' caliber. Still his journey was still in its infancy and there would be no shortage of such people going forward, of that he was sure. Where Dido fit into all of this Ares didn't know but it didn't matter because he was leaving! He'd gotten to the tenth stage, for real this time as a full body check with disintegration and Omniscience revealed nothing out of the ordinary, so it was time to skedaddle and get back to Isaz.
Ares desummoned Garuda, packed up the Protection Racket, and took to his feet. Ignoring the dispersing crowd behind him, some of who were taking pictures and yelling for autographs thanks to Ares' Brotherhood robes, Ares placed his hand on the barrier and shut his eyes. He could feel the cracked gap in a single heartbeat thanks to his affiliation for nothingness and widened it just enough for him to step through. He was going to hop in, shut it behind him, and permanently close the passageway so that nobody else could accidentally stumble into it and get sucked up into the void. Maybe Ares would find other ways of sneaking outside the barrier in the future but, for now, he was content to spend about a day or so checking out the world at large. It was a nice detour but there was still much left to do in Sheryashka ad he hadn't even yet touched Vraizon! Ares hopped into the broken avenue of space and let the void swirl around him. He didn't fight the pull because he didn't have to; he'd already altered the course before his initial ingress to this pathway and nothing had changed since then... Or so he hoped... Ares caught sight of something he really didn't want to see right now lurking amongst the red waves churning through this space...
A blue glow...
Dido was interfering again! She'd left him alone during his tribulation but apparently she was trying to pick one last fight with Ares before he left for good. Ares used Omniscience and could detect a spatial anomaly, tiny in nature, causing some minor complications on the backend. It wasn't much, and really Ares was surprised Dido even bothered, as the effect would only delay his journey by about an hour two... Had the spatial magic used been any more powerful it could have changed the end warp destination and thrown him for a complete loop but it would have been more visible and easy to spot, hence why she didn't attempt such a thing... But then why even bother with this? Ares merely flicked away the inconvenience and his route back to Isaz returned to normal immediately, there would no longer be any hiccups or delays. Perhaps Dido hadn't expected him to catch on to her games, and thus be mindful of the blue glow, this quickly? It felt like there was more to this but Ares couldn't for the life of him figure out Dido's goal here. If she had knowledge of spatial magic then she'd also be aware that what she'd just done was mostly pointless as there was no real way for that level of spatial magic to break anything important within this passageway. Rather, it was also oddly visible. Ares hadn't noticed anything at all during the fake tribulation and that was apparently done by the same person who made their next move this extremely obvious? It didn't add up. If Dido's magic was going to be easy to detect and spot from the start then why not take more drastic measures and unleash real chaos? Ares' head was going to explode! He still had to figure out how negative time worked, his understanding of the concept was half baked at best, and now he had to uncover the hidden meaning behind Dido's strange attempt at bothering him! Neither problem seemed easy to discern the truth behind them so Ares was going to have to seriously ponder each of hem for al long while going forward...
BEEEEEEP
"What now?!" Ares' head was already spinning and now there was some strange beeping noise that echoed through his entire body and soul. He followed the origin of the noise and eventually located a glowing rune on his Brotherhood robes that he momentarily refused to acknowledge... "SON OF A B..." Ares took multiple deep breaths, placed his hand over his rapidly beating heart, and calmed himself to the best of his ability...
That was the Brotherhood Call rune and it was directing him toward the person who activated it.
It wasn't in the same direction the elf and Finnian left earlier which meant somebody else in the clan was trying to summon everyone to their position... This was terrible. Ares could still exit the passageway if need be, he wasn't incapable of returning outside the barrier as he'd barely entered it... But he would never get back in! His nightmare scenario had come to pass and he wasn't sure how to proceed. Worse still, he'd already taken measures to shut the exit so his decision making period was a grand total of about a minute before he was forced to pick between angering the Brotherhood, and potentially getting kicked out forever, or abandoning his home world for a while... Plus there was the Dido matter on top of all that. Ares had double checked the robes just in case but the Call was real and not another one of Dido's illusions. He would have been annoyed but relieved if that were true but this was just a terrible stroke of luck at the worst possible time and nothing more. The elf lady and Finnian were in the middle of saving lives, so they weren't obligated to answer the Call, hell the elf lady very nearly used the Call herself so her absence would be understandable, but Ares?... The Call rune operated much like a tribulation did and decided whether or not the wearer could answer the Call based on their own unbiased thoughts. Ares knew he could leave this place, and he wasn't really in a tough spot that prevented him from following the Call, so his judgement would not be positive if he ran away... He was so close to leaving... Was he really going to have to stay out here!?