In Sum'gial's opinion, the difference between gods and mortals comes down to divine power and faith. A good con man or liar could possibly become a god in a matter of weeks. However, it's not so simple to become a god after all. Between mortals and gods, another level of life exists. People call them legends—or, as Sum'gial likes to put it, Transcendents.
Mortals have a limit to how strong they can become. If they surpass that limit, they become Transcendents or legends. For wizards, casting a legendary spell; for warriors, accomplishing a legendary feat such as slaying a dragon—any act that exceeds mortal limits grants Transcendent status.
Sum'gial's research showed that Transcendents and mortals have different life levels. This life level is a reward from the Almighty. Any legend lives a long life; a legend's life expectancy, depending on the species, is about ten times longer than a mortal's. Sum'gial thinks those people are reserved for god positions by the Almighty.
The real problem with becoming a god is faith. Faith itself is a poison. The Mushroom Queen is a great example of how poisonous faith is. Can a god control their believers? Godhood itself is a trap unless conceptual godhood is achieved. A good example of a conceptual god is the Magic God; as wizards grow strong, so does the Magic God.
The duties of the Magic God are simple as well: maintain the magic network and provide feedback from the network to pioneer magic users. There are no priests or paladins who follow the Magic God.
Sum'gial divides gods into three: World Gods (such as the King of Hell), Faith Gods, and Conceptual Gods.
He didn't wish to have divine responsibilities; a single tower was already driving his OCD crazy.
As Sum'gial worked on the mechanical eye project, idle thoughts kept bothering him.
Ahr'zel POV
Ahr'zel thought about how everything in his life had changed in a couple of days. One moment he was in Hell; the next, he was in a library working for a lich. He couldn't understand what was going on anymore.
He knew the lich's plan was solid, and he was getting paid for it. Nonetheless, he wasn't sure about pulling the King of Hell into the lich's scheme. The die was cast, and he would make the most of it.
As he worked on the shelf of Ther'vassi blueprints, he realized he had no choice but to comply. The true-name operation had succeeded; his true name had changed. He was now obsessed with organizing the library. Anything out of place made his skin crawl.
Now he was more lawful than any other devil in existence. As he remembered how the Will of Hell rose to the material world—along with the King of Hell's attention—the fear of their sheer presence made his spine crawl and his skin sweat.
They looked at him like a bug that had shed its skin. A mild curiosity, nothing more. Would they follow the script set by the lich? He had no idea. He was out of his depth, and his prize was barely a fragment of the Hand of God.
Ther'vassi were blasphemous; they had tried to use the Hand for necromancy. The lich never used it, but kept it for his own purposes. As a devil, he had no fear of gods, but he was afraid of consequences. Gods don't make deals with their lessers; they take whatever they want.
The lich claimed that the Hand was of elven origin, as was the Kingdom of God—which was currently the Tower of Bones. Ahr'zel would take the Hand and become a god regardless of the consequences. He would serve the lich for a thousand years and plan his ascent to godhood during that time. His subordinates would follow him. He would ensure that.
Veyn'dor POV
Necromancy—or, as I would like to call it, the study of life and death—starts with turning any dead creature into an undead. From the simplest cantrip to the hardest space-time magic, necromancy uses harming, weakening, protecting, sustaining, animating the dead, speaking with the dead, and many other spells to gain power.
Necromancy draws on the negative energies of both the caster and the magic network. I don't know where these energies originate, but I possess mostly negative energies, which means I can pursue necromancy to the highest level. The other avenues to power are closed to me, as I don't possess the agility of a rogue nor the strength of a warrior.
Wizards use magic to affect their surroundings; warriors use magic to affect their own bodies, whether they are aware of it or not. I am not sure what lies ahead, but I will one day reach the very top in wizardry.
As Veyn'dor read his father's old journal—one he had paid a steep price for—he tried to understand his father's motives. Yet all he could see was chaos. He was well aware of the Mushroom Queen's desire to create chaos and her capriciousness.
Throughout the history of E'nathyr, over three thousand houses rose to prominence and fell, despite the city having less than a thousand years' history. Many major houses, even those vital to the city's interests, fell in the blink of an eye. The losers were written out of the history books, existing only in private journals.
His father's aim was obvious to him: to survive. But he couldn't see how his father would survive. The matrons had prepared over one hundred thousand slaves to be used as cannon fodder, and an army of forty thousand drow—including wizards, priestesses, warriors, archers, and men and women who had mastered the art of killing to perfection—all for him. Yet he had an ominous feeling.
The number of backup plans he had used in the academy was over twenty; his father probably had more. How many trump cards did an archmage lich have? The assassins and spies he had sent over the years to discover those trump cards were countless, yet he still couldn't uncover them.
The matrons couldn't wait anymore either; they would set off in three months' time and take the Tower of Bones from him.
Jacob POV
Jacob swung his sword toward the Death Knight, who easily caught the high swing, countering with a shove and a cut at Jacob's pivotal leg. Jacob shifted his weight, pulled his right leg back, and swung again in a diagonal cut. The undead knight slipped aside and tried to injure Jacob's right arm.
"Enough. Go back to guarding the door," Jacob said as he dodged the slash. The undead obediently returned to the door.
Jacob knew the undead didn't have to keep him alive to follow his orders. The knight wanted to make him a companion by injuring him with a cursed sword; then Jacob would become undead and fall under Sum'gial's command. He knew this spar was necessary to keep his body active and his instincts sharp.
He hadn't expected this level of learning and strength from the undead knight. While alive, Jacob was sure the knight had been a Transcendent warrior like himself. Undead warriors had obvious weaknesses, but the armor designed by Sum'gial covered almost all of them. The rest of the mercenary squad's numbers, however, were dwindling.
Jacob knew the matrons and the Academy of Wizards were hunting the undead to study the weaknesses of Sum'gial's craftsmanship. He had done similar studies in the past. When Jacob informed Sum'gial of these studies, the lich told him he had only three months left in E'nathyr.
Jacob didn't know enough about the city to understand how Sum'gial reached that conclusion, but he understood it was close enough for him to make a few moves. He was informed that Malvek was on his way to E'nathyr with a new batch of slaves. The chaos created by merchants pulling out of the city could potentially delay the war for a week or two.
He demanded an additional clause in the contract he and Sum'gial had made and got a positive reply: the amended contract stated that the more he delayed the war, the less he would have to serve Sum'gial.
Regardless of the consequences, he would cause chaos—as much destruction as possible. Before he made his moves, though, he would wait for Malvek. Malvek was much smarter than he was and more adept at intrigue.
Malvek POV
Malvek—too tall for a dark dwarf, too stocky for a dark elf, and far too hairy for a human—was a mixture of all three. He rode a cave-lizard guided by a mushroom-crown halter; his convoy moved in disciplined silence, for the Underdeep hears better than it sees.
Malvek had become one of the first Transcendent merchants. Thanks to his ill-favored heritage, his father's sharp intellect, and his mother's endless lectures on the merchant's way, he rose to legend. From E'nathyr to the stronghold of Gromun-dahr—even the dark-dwarf holdfasts—he was welcome to trade, never to stay.
The deal he made with Sum'gial at the Tower of Bones was simple: the lich would never trouble him or his descendants; in return, Malvek would assist Jacob with all his might. His mother's earlier bargain had not covered his bloodline; this one would free it from the lich's clutches permanently.
He held enough gold to hire a legendary company and carve out a permanent territory beneath the dwarven kingdom—a haven for the unwanted: humans, wizards, any and all who were willing to live by his laws.
For now, he would close the lich's account. Sum'gial had been blunt: for every week Jacob delayed the matrons and their armies, a decade would be shaved from Jacob's servitude. If the E'nathyr muster quickened, the lich would turn them both into undead.
Malvek did not think Sum'gial was bluffing. Jacob was a warrior and an adequate general, but Malvek knew an army marches on its stomach. He would call in every favor he'd extended, use every trick—even the Orchid Cult wouldn't be spared his financial offensive. The city of E'nathyr would face its first war of money.
In E'nathyr, news ran faster than mushroom-crowned lizards. A rumor here and there, a few assassinations, a couple of bribes and blackmails—he could delay the army's march by six weeks. If he managed to spark a war between the major Houses, he could delay it indefinitely. That would happen only if the Mushroom Queen lost interest in the Tower of Bones—a doubtful prospect.
No Underdeep merchant was stupid. With a couple of bulk purchases, he could create a food crisis that would leave the army hungry and unwilling to march for at least a week. He would arrange the assassination of Veyn'dor as well; a dead legendary wizard would delay them at least two weeks.
A dead matron in any major House would also delay or weaken the army; he could introduce the plagues Sum'gial had created to E'nathyr. Although they would not cause many drow deaths, they would certainly thin the cannon-fodder ranks.
He could send a young drow noble to the brain flayers; they definitely didn't want E'nathyr expanding its influence.
As more intrigues, divisive thoughts, and assassination plans unspooled, a cruel smile curved his mouth.