Imagiserum: Episode 1

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Imagiserum: Episode 1
Source: collected/021-imagiserum-episode-1.mp3
SHA-256: f1597b6ba49bb7cbd5a9e3572908e6d354114056983cef158093774f5ed85010
Model: scribe_v2 | Transcribed: 2026-10-10T18:12:11.773875+00:00
Machine transcript — uncorrected. Speaker labels are local to this recording and do not identify people.

[00:00:00.000] Speaker 1: Imagiserum.

[00:00:46.160] Speaker 1: Chapter One: High in the Peaks. Shale stared up at the Source Anomaly with naked greed. Here was the power to become a god. But it was not for him, and though that ground at him, he would bring it back to the Guild of Self as commanded – assuming they could get there first. He tried to open his tent, but when he pulled aside the flap, he found the entrance buried by snow. Wretched

[00:01:20.960] Speaker 1: substance. He started digging out the snow but grew impatient and simply crawled through the narrow opening at the top. Shale dragged himself out of the tent and rose to stand. Some of the tents had been buried in last night's blizzard. Only low mounds of snow marked where they had once stood. The people inside were likely dead, but it probably wasn't anyone important. Everyone important – that is, everyone from the Guild of Self – had enchanted tents that melted the snow as it fell. There were no guarantees in these

[00:01:55.680] Speaker 1: conditions, though. There were no guarantees with enchantments in general. It wasn't the magic that was unreliable; it was the people. How could you trust anyone who worked for coin? Shale certainly didn't trust them. He called out to the camp around him. "Up and out! Up and out!" There was movement in a few of the tents around him. People climbed, shivering and weak from their own snow tombs, dark circles around their eyes. He'd let them sleep for nearly two hours. It should have been more than enough.

[00:02:31.360] Speaker 1: Never mind that a blizzard was coming through and they'd been forced to hunker down anyway. Shale had his apprentice do a fairly quick tally of the expedition party. Seventeen dead, thirty still living. Of the seventeen dead, fourteen were Ungilded, and two of them from the Guild of Light. Unsurprising, really, given their relatively weak fortitude. More mages for hire. You couldn't even trust them to keep themselves alive. Perhaps if he'd paid them more, they would have tried harder.

[00:03:06.260] Speaker 1: Only one of the Guild of Self mages had perished in the storm. Her tent had collapsed while she was on an Aether walk. Shale knew this because she'd had the good sense to report everything she'd seen to his second soul, even as the blizzard raged around her collapsed tent, even as the snow suffocated her. This was the kind of fortitude he expected. She had lived and died well. Her final Aether walk was the reason he was roused right now. Time was limited. The Aether

[00:03:40.980] Speaker 1: walker had found a rival expedition on the north face of the mountain. Mages from both the Guild of Enchanting and the Guild of Progress, working together, trekking through the blizzard. Blast them. Shale looked up at the peak of the mountain, roughly where the Source Anomaly must be. He couldn't see it with his normal eyes, of course, but he knew it was there. He turned to shout at the sluggish expedition crew. "No! There's no time for a fire. We're moving immediately after the transmission." A haggard-looking man,

[00:04:16.100] Speaker 1: nearly buried under innumerable layers of clothing, stepped forward. His fellow Ungilded compatriots stood in a loose group behind him, looking down at the ground, arms wrapped around themselves. "Sir, we've lost fourteen men. Have some heart." Shale casually narrowed his eyes at the man. He couldn't remember his name. The man stared back. The people behind him continued looking at the ground. The mages silently drifted away from the collection of Ungilded, sensing some

[00:04:51.120] Speaker 1: impending threat that the regular people could not. Suppressors were not well known among the Ungilded. Unfortunately, that meant he couldn't ride the coattails of his kind's reputation. Fear could be taught, however. Shale closed his eyes and stepped into his second self – his soul. He opened his second eyes and detached his soul from his body. It was usually dark in the Aether, but the Source Anomaly lit up everything here like a false sun. Shale glanced to the left and saw three Aether walker souls. They had

[00:05:25.720] Speaker 1: silently slipped into their second selves as well to watch. He stepped forward and reached out with his shimmering, iridescent right hand, gripped the man's soul, and squeezed. He peeked through the eyes of his first self – his living body. It still stood ten feet away from the other man, but he could see the heavily wrapped man's face contorting in agony. His hands were locked in claw-like grips, tearing at his own chest, trying in vain to pull away a phantom attacker. Shale released his grip on the man's

[00:06:00.420] Speaker 1: soul and let his second self drift back into alignment and reattach to his body. The other man fell to the snow like a puppet with cut strings. He was unconscious, but still breathing. His compatriots, who seemed only minimally invested in this person's rebellion, quickly scattered and went about making themselves useful. None of them asked what happened. Good. He didn't need their understanding, only their obedience, in whatever form that came. Shale's apprentice, Riva, approached him once she felt

[00:06:35.396] Speaker 1: it was safe to do so. Her head was shaven, but she only had two lines of branding on her forehead. The three remaining Aether Walkers stood just behind her with their hands behind their backs, unshaven heads bowed. A single line branded their foreheads. Sir, the air has cleared enough for a transmission. Shale nodded and followed Riva to a place nearby, set just far away from the camp to be respectful. Or secretive. Who knew with the Guild of Light? There was no reason to hide your magic when you

[00:07:10.436] Speaker 1: didn't sell it. A lone man stood at the cliff's edge, his back to them. The man's silhouette struck an imposing figure framed by the rising sun before him. He was statue still, eyes closed, pointing accusingly at some place in the far distance. A barely perceptible thread of light ran from that finger to the point in the distance. It flickered rapidly. The Light Mage spoke without moving. To move would be to break the connection to the tower a hundred miles in the distance. This is the

[00:07:45.296] Speaker 1: Vessel. This is Suppressor Shale. And even though he was speaking directly to a Light Mage, and not the Vessels, he bowed his head, mostly out of habit. Report, Suppressor Shale. We are a half day from the anomaly. A blizzard slowed our progress. An Aether Walker scout discovered another expedition on the north face. I apologize for my performance. We know. They could not be bought

[00:08:19.996] Speaker 1: off. Secure the anomaly at any cost to yourself and others. We have spoken. Shale hesitated. Technically, he wasn't supposed to speak again, but there were times when practicality trumped etiquette, even when speaking to the Vessels. Are you asking that I kill them, Vessel? We have spoken. The Light Mage handling the transmission opened one eye to look at Shale. He was clearly uncomfortable with that last

[00:08:54.876] Speaker 1: message. Putting an Ungilded in their place was one thing, but killing dozens of Gilded Mages in cold blood? Well, that was another. It wasn't the kind of thing the other guilds would just ignore. It would mean war. Then again, if you had the power of Source itself, it wouldn't be a very long war. Shale had to trust in the Vessels' wisdom. He tried to reassure the Light Mage. It won't come to that. The man lowered his arm and walked away from the cliff's edge without speaking. He didn't look convinced, however.

[00:09:30.376] Speaker 1: Hopefully he would not become a problem. The moment his back was turned, Shale felt a ripple on his soul, the equivalent of a shoulder tap in the Aether. He closed his eyes. Riva's soul shimmered next to his. Should we force him over the edge? No. But the Vessels... I am in command here. They did not order death, they merely allowed for it. Riva's soul slinked back into her body, and then they followed the Light Mage back to camp. The man remained

[00:10:04.896] Speaker 1: ignorant of how close he'd come to death. Once they were back in the camp, an Ungilded woman rushed the newly returned group. A storm! Sir, another storm from the north! Bigger this time. Bigger? Much bigger. We need to prepare. Shale grit his teeth. It seemed as if the world itself were conspiring against him. At least this time it would hit the other expedition first. Would they stop and hunker down in shelter too? Shale looked up at the peak. It was a prize of

[00:10:39.396] Speaker 1: incalculable value. No, they wouldn't stop. They wouldn't stop for anything. And neither would he. Chapter Two Secrets in the Snow Shale closed his eyes to see with his second sight. The Source shone like a brilliant foaming star in the black behind his eyes. It was so bright he instinctively tried to shield his eyes, but couldn't. Second sight was a trade for blind sight, and despite what the other Gilded might think,

[00:11:14.656] Speaker 1: it wasn't always a good one. Like all magic power, it was a trade of peace for power. When it came to magic, you always paid the price in pain, one way or another. He rode through the blackness of the Ire, like a man in the backseat of a carriage, dimly aware of another self somewhere else. That man was in pain. Shale averted his second eyes from the Source, only occasionally glancing at it. Much like the sun, it was painful to stare at. Now that

[00:11:49.676] Speaker 1: he was closer, he could see indigo sparks flying off like little stars all their own, streaking through the Aether like magical arrows. One purple ember zipped his way. He threw his second body down and felt the ember warp his soul as it passed. Unbelievable power. He stood back up in the Aether. Fortunately, his first body, his real one, hadn't thrown itself down in the snow in mirror. It was still obediently trudging up the mountain. If just the radiation it was throwing off could do that,

[00:12:24.928] Speaker 1: what would happen when he got closer still? For the first time since they'd begun their trek just two weeks ago, he was beginning to have second thoughts. They could just let it burn out. But then they would never know what the anomaly was. Its secrets would belong to the guilds of enchanting and progress, and that was unacceptable. Toward danger, then. The blizzard wind cut through his cloak, once again reminding Shale that his real body was withering in the savage cold.

[00:13:00.208] Speaker 1: A wall of white had replaced the thinning alpine forest hours ago, cutting him off from the rest of his group. Soon after the storm hit, he'd told Riva to turn back and seek shelter. There was no use in her dying, too. He would press on alone. Shale had spent most of the time since the whiteout in his second body, away from the frantic thoughts of a dying mind. It was easier to push his meat self forward when his consciousness was on this side. It was more like driving a pack animal this way. Still, it wasn't wise to ignore those

[00:13:35.048] Speaker 1: base fears. You could drive a pack animal to death, after all, by ignoring its plight. That was the price of magic. You always paid in pain. That was when his first body tripped and fell. Shale rolled his second eyes, then stepped back into his body to take more direct control of the situation. The wind screamed around him. It didn't feel right to call it a wind anymore. It was a suffocating wall of frigid white pain. Worryingly, his feet and

[00:14:09.988] Speaker 1: hands didn't hurt at all. They felt like great blocks of ice on the ends of wooden poles. He would lose fingers and toes. Maybe all of them. He stood on numb limbs and pressed forward anyway, guided only by the growing brilliance of the source anomaly in his second sight. He desperately wanted to tuck his hands under his cloak, but knew if he lost his balance again, he might not get up. It didn't matter how strong his soul was if the container broke. He would have a front row seat to his own death. And when his

[00:14:44.708] Speaker 1: body finally went cold, it would drag his soul away to the great beyond. He couldn't let that happen. He had to keep moving. He Shale tripped over something in the whiteout. Thankfully, he kept upright. A mound in the snow. It had a sort of disturbing give to it when he'd hit it with his foot. He walked around it and tried to push the thought from his mind. He didn't dare slip into his second self now. The detached clarity was a useful tool, but it might be lethal at this point.

[00:15:20.068] Speaker 1: Soon after the thought finished crawling through his mind, he stepped out of the storm. The sensation was immediate and surreal. Shale stood in a perfectly circular clearing. The air was a little chill, but completely still. He turned to look behind him. A wall of white raged and churned just a few feet away, its howling muffled to a soft, whistling whine. What the He looked up. A cylinder of calm, clear air all

[00:15:55.048] Speaker 1: the way to bright blue sky. And in the center of it all was a ramshackle wood cabin. A stone chimney puffed a thin line of smoke. The house was dilapidated, but not quite falling apart. Considering where he'd been, it was beyond inviting. It was unreal. Which was a distinct possibility. Perhaps this was a figment of a dying mind. Or maybe he'd already crossed over without realizing it. Shale stumbled toward the cabin. He certainly felt alive.

[00:16:30.248] Speaker 1: Which was not to say good. The front door was slightly ajar. The warm glow of firelight lit the interior, but he couldn't make out much of what was inside. He paused twenty feet from the door. There was something piled up in the snow against the side of the house. A lot of something. Instead of going straight inside, he hobbled over to investigate. When he saw what it was, he stopped walking. A tiny shoe. Poking out of a mound of snow taller than he was.

[00:17:05.328] Speaker 1: His frozen mind began to register the other shapes in the mound. Hands. Feet. Faces. Dozens of them. Some of them far too small. The pile wrapped around the back of the house. Discarded people. Shale stumbled backward, hoping that this was a dream. This was not the miracle he'd imagined. It was a nightmare. And he knew then that it was too cruel to be an illusion. Someone had already claimed the power of a

[00:17:39.888] Speaker 1: god. And they had been very, very

[00:17:44.188] Speaker 1: busy.