Chapter Four Hundred And Fifty One - 451
Within his spacious captains' quarters, Felix had made something of a nest for himself. After a few experiments, Green Shaping had proven the most effective for building creature comforts. The ice chairs from before had been fine, but a cold butt after hours of core diving wasn't a fun experience.
Unlike Stone and Rime Shaping though, Green Shaping couldn't simply fabricate plant life where there was nonethat seemed to be a result of the type of Mana it affected. Stone was earth mana, Rime was ice Mana, and both of them could be fashioned entirely out of his own stores in the rare case he didn't have the raw materials to hand. Green Shaping, however, was control over life Mana, which was fairly nebulous as a concept. Growing things, suffusing them with further life, that Felix could manifest directly from his channels. Straight up manifesting wood and vines and stuff was beyond the Skill's scope.
Mana, Felix had learned, was a product of the Grand Harmony. It composed all of the Corporeal Realm, not just infusing things but as an intrinsic part of them. Felix could see it with his Manasight. A simple flex of the Skill showed Mana floating around him in rivers of vapor, the walls and floor and air itself filled with it. There was a bit more to reality than just Mana, such as Essence, but in this case Mana was all he was concerned about. With each moment more of it was absorbed into his Mana Gates, which functioned as apertures and a sort of filter for most people; nine of them in the palms, elbows, knees, feet, and one at the base of the skull. For them, it kept non-attuned Mana types from entering their channels. For Felix that was a nonissue, as his Unbound nature made all Mana types compatible with his core. Mana types, like the Grand Harmony itself, were all just a spectrum of vibrations, after all. When he activated one of his many Skills, their song sent shivers of Mana through his channels, the end result being the manifestation of the Skill itself. In the case of Green Shaping, that meant he could pour out life Mana bent on growing and shaping plantlife.
All he had to do was find a bit of wood.
That had been a chore, but thankfully a chore he could assign to one of his many followers. Wood was rare in the desert, though Felix doubted that would remain the case, what with the new abundance of fresh water. Turned out, there were a few wooden objects they'd taken from the old Grandmaster's house. So now Felix sat upon the remains of three small statues: one of a woman holding a sword, another of a man with a book, and the last of a fat pig-like creature, lying on its back. It was pretty cute. Each one was carved of ancient wood, but all contained tiny pieces that drank up the life Mana he provided, growing new shoots from their otherwise hardened forms. These he bent with his Will, growing the shoots into wide branches that formed a roughly circular bench. Additional branches split off, many of them going down to the deck and growing in between the chitin boards to secure it all. Foliage sprouted along the tops, a thick, moss-like greenery that was pretty comfortable to lounge on.
Once he was sure it could handle their combined weight, Felix settled in, making an effort to relax his shoulders and neck. "Alright Pit. Our turn next."
"Yesss!" The fur pillow behind him rumbled in delight. Pit was sprawled along the rear of the circular bench, nestled close to Felix's back. The pleasure that had radiated off the Chimera once he realized he would fit had been nearly palpable, and now it shifted toward a more enthusiastic glee. "I can't wait to show you everything!"
Felix smiled, and cracked a single eyelid. Pit's beak and bright golden eyes hovered by his knee, quivering in excitement. "Close your eyes, and breathe deep."
"Okay okay. Got it." Pit did as instructed, screwing his eyes shut and laying his triangular ears against his skull. "What was next? Right. Breathing. In," he sucked in a breath like a bellows. "Out." It came out, just as harsh.
"Just like back in Nagast," Felix reminded him. "Hold still."
Cardinal Flame!
Felix swooned, his Mind cast backward and down, thrown along with his Mana into freefall. His control meant it twisted, coursing into his Companion's Mana Gates and snaking through his channels in a blink, a flash of thought. Unlike his other friends, Pit was different. Chimeras were different, somehow. A Race but with monstrous features, such as a monster core as opposed to a core space. A solid, spherical core that sat heavily at the junction of all his channels, where Pit's power radiated outward. Functionally similar to a core space, but fundamentally different.
Or so he thought.
Felix landed with flexed knees in the center of a verdant forest, to the babbling sound of a distant river and the incessant noise of animals, insects, and beasts. "What the hell?" Before, when Felix had inspected Pit's core, he had visualized it as a solid lump of magical material crackling with lightning. Now...now it was so very different. Felix spun in a circle, eyes panning everything he could, from the ancient trees to the distant mountains and the endless, summer blue sky. "What the hell is this?"
"You like it?" Pit landed nimbly next to him, having no trouble with the thick canopy and looming trees. The tenku was perhaps the size of a terrier, similar to how he'd been when they had first entered Shelim.The original appearance of this chapter can be found at Ñøv€lß1n.
"You're tiny."
Pit hopped twice and spun in a quick circle, lightning trailing after his bushy fox tail. "I know! Isn't it great!"
Felix knelt down, and Pit rushed into his arms, trilling in joy. He ran his hands over Pit's feathers and fur, feeling the alternating textures and thick warmth from his projected Body. "You've packed a lot of detail into your visualized Body, bud. This is a really good job." Pit warbled at him, head still nestled against Felix's neck. "And this place...is this the Foglands?"
His Perception unfurled, rolling through copse and grove, meadow and field. The forest he'd gotten to know so well back in his earliest days on the Continent was here, and even the River Eile was there, with its enormous river lilies dotting the edges. Which meant the distant babbling was in fact the waterfall Felix had once taken a ride down, quite unwillingly. If I go that way, will the Stronghold be there, as well? How faithful is this recreation?
Felix almost started walking toward that direction when his Perception snagged on something different. Something changed from his memory of the forest. "What is that?"
"It is."
"Fascinating." He ran an age-spotted hand over a particularly low-hanging vine. "You have done well, Pit."
The Chimera puffed up in pride, throwing his tiny chest out. Felix grinned. "He has. My question is...well it's more confusion. Last time I saw, Pit had a monster core, not a core space. After his Evolution he now does. Is this...normal?"
"Ah yes. Your Evolution. Stormwing Tenku, yes? And a Primordial on top of that, just as your Companion. Hm." Karys tapped his lips in thought.
"He even has a tree as part of his core. Like me. Does that mean anything?" Felix asked.
"It could mean the visualizations you harnessed within your core space are influencing his through the Companion bond. Perhaps. Or perhaps it is simply a case of independent discovery. This," Karys paused and looked around. "This is Nagast, after all, is it not?"
"Yup!" Pit said excitedly. "Home!"
"Right. And your home well before Felix ever found you, yes?" At Pit's nod, Karys spread his hands. "There we have it. His core space is a recreation of his home. As our visualizations are predominantly subconscious, at least at first, to have it resemble something so close to heart is a natural occurrence."
Felix huffed an amused breath. "My core is the cold depths of space. That's not exactly home sweet home for me."
Karys shrugged his wide shoulders, still surprisingly built for an old man. "Not even the greatest scholars among the Nym and Geist knew all the secrets of core space formation. Perhaps being an Unbound affects your own visualization process?"
Felix waved off that line of thought. "I'll deal with my own stuff later. What about his core? It isn't a sphere or a ring shape. It's"
"A Star," Karys breathed. His green eyes grew large before the Nym gasped in sudden pain. He threw his hands up, grabbing at his skull. "A Star!"
"Karys!" Felix grabbed the man as he sagged to his knees, but before he could really be worried Karys stood back up. "Uh, what was that?"
"Memories," the Nym panted. "The holes in my memories have not progressed...in a long while, not since...you granted me a new Body...but I found more. Oh, Mercy Upon High, I found more." Karys shuddered in Felix's arms, only once, before he gently pushed away. "I am fine. It is simply an...existential agony to find the raw edges of my Mind."
"Jeez, Karys. I'm sorry. I didn't know it hurt you to remember..."
"Think nothing of it." Felix's Chancellor took a deep, fortifying breath. "I did, however, recall one thing. We Nym called the Chimera the Children of Harmony, the Guardian Beasts, and, most appropriately it seems, the Wardens of the Stars."
"Wardens of the Stars?" Felix glanced at Pit. The tenku was growing more pleased with every new title he heard. "As in the Nymean Stars? Found in literally every piece of Nymean art and ruin I've encountered?"
"The very same. I...cannot recall the how or why, but Chimeras are linked to it all." He jabbed a slender finger at the four-pointed core. "Their very cores have something to do with it."
"Huh."
"Chimeras are beast and mortal, Monster Type and Race all at once. They bridge two worlds, and while I cannot recall the meaning behind it, their nature is a fusion." Karys put a hand on Felix's shoulder and extended another to Pit's upturned face. "A bond between realms."
