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42 - Light of Guidance
🕑 Added 2024-07-27 20:32:30 +0000 UTCRunar placed dark curtains over the windows of his office, completely shutting out the light from the cave outside. Instead, the room was only lit by seven candles that had been placed on the ground. Alicia was drawing a pattern on the ground, where each of the candles was acting as what seemed to be an important component tying it all together.
Once she was done drawing the pattern, Alicia placed the ceramic bottle she was carrying on her hip into its centre, pulling its cork with a slight 'pop'.
"Alright, so... what now? How does this work?" Ryan asked, staring at the bottle. He was both excited and anxious, worrying whether or not this was really going to work. If this woman really was the most powerful living mage, and even she couldn't find the last fragment, then nobody would be able to, right?
Alicia slowly stood up, petting the dust off her long skirt, "It's very simple. Spirits are special beings. They are beings made of mana, and we have found that mana can cause mana with the same wavelength to resonate over long distances. Actually, from our tests, there doesn't seem to be a real decline in the resonance when comparing medium distances to extremely long distances. Even across planar dimensions, it seems like mana of the same wavelength can resonate with itself."
Ryan tried to follow along with what she was saying, "So basically... because spirits are made of mana, you can make Gaia's fragments resonate with the last piece?"
"Yes, exactly," with a slight hum, Alicia nodded, "That being the case, in a practical, non-experiment setting, things get a bit more complicated. Since we don't already know the location and are trying to find it, we need to set up a beacon, and this beacon needs to consist of a large amount of mana. In this case, it means we need more than half of the spirit core, which you have!"
Alicia held forward her hand, as if waiting for something. She looked at him with a smile for a while, but Ryan didn't know exactly what she wanted.
"Ryan, I think she needs you to give Gaia's fragments to her," Silvia nudged his side, and he quickly reacted.
"Oh, right, sorry, uhm... just let me..." slowly, Ryan looked inwardly at Gaia's domain. The two fragments were still peacefully floating, and Ryan tried to carefully pull them both out, as he would with Maximus. Before long, threads of green mana flowed down Ryan's arms, gathering together to form the two crystal fragments on his palm. And at the same moment, red wisps of mana flowed down Ryan's legs, as Maximus appeared beside him.
The knight had been inside of his domain since last night, but clearly wanted to be out here to watch what was about to happen. Curious, and not sure what to focus on directly, Alicia's eyes moved back and forth between the fragments and the actual spirit standing next to Ryan.
"Oh! Look at how wonderful they both look!" Alicia pointed out, "Their mana is just so beautiful!"
Slowly, Ryan placed the two fragments onto Alicia's hand. He was a bit nervous to let them go, but if Runar knew her personally, she wouldn't do anything wrong with them... right?
Maximus' sight was following the fragments the whole time, and Ryan looked down at him. He squatted down, "Are you alright?"
Maximus turned toward Ryan nodded his head just once, but then quickly looked back at Alicia with the fragments. Ryan didn't know what was going through the knight's head, but hearing all those things from Runar last night must have not been easy for him either. Hearing what exactly caused these problems, and there were many more spirits out there that had suffered similarly could not have felt great to him.
"We'll find them all, don't worry," Ryan promised, and Maximus hesitated briefly, but then once more nodded. Though Ryan said that, he wasn't even sure himself if that was possible. Sure, it was what he wanted, but you couldn't get everything you want in this world. But if what Alicia was about to do worked, then that was a first step in achieving that.
"Don't worry," Runar walked up next to Ryan, placing his hand onto his shoulder for a moment, "Clairvoyance is one of Alicia's strong suits."
"One of many~!" Alicia agreed, as she placed the two fragments into a small circle within the drawn pattern.
"H-How... how did you end up meeting Miss Boreard anyway?" Modak wondered, curiously looking at Runar, who couldn't help himself but scoff
"Miss Boreard? Seriously?"
Alicia glared at Runar, "Leave him be, the boy got manners. You could learn a thing or two from him, you know?"
"Yeah, yeah, whatever. I awakened pretty young, and Rune Mage is a pretty rare class. We didn't have anyone directly in the family that could teach me, so I went to the Magic Tower for training. And Alicia is the one that taught me," with crossed arms, Runar looked over at the elf, who was nodding her head proudly.
"And look at how well he turned out for it. He learned from the best," she pointed out, and Modak was almost stunned, barely able to get his words out.
"Y-You were her student? That... really?" he let out in disbelief, and Runar slightly narrowed his eyes.
"I'm not sure why you're in such disbelief there. I'm a very capable man."
Ryan scoffed, "Yeah, sure."
"What's that supposed to mean?"
"You know exactly what that's supposed to mean," Ryan smirked.
"Well, sure... I can be a little forgetful sometimes, but I've got a lot of things on my plate. And, I'm capable enough to make you guys these!" Runar quickly walked over to his desk, trying to find the three metal plates he prepared earlier. He had to search for a while because he had a hard time seeing things with just the dim candle-light, but he found them soon enough. Runar walked over to the three newcomers, handing each of them one of the plates.
"Put this into your phone-case, with the array pointing to your phone, and you should get a signal down here," he explained, turning to his nephew with a smug grin, "I feel like that's pretty capable, don't 'cha think?
"Well... it's a good start," Ryan joked lightly, pulling out his phone. He peeled the case off and placed the thin plate inside. As he turned the screen on, almost being blinded by the bright light, he soon saw a few bars appear in the corner of the screen. He was even getting a Wi-fi signal from upstairs now. A few messages came in that he had missed while down here.
One from his mom, sending him a recipe for lemon-bars that she found. Some from Yanna, talking about a workout plan that her and Ryan had been trying to figure out for him. And then, in the flood of random notifications from apps of phone games he meant to uninstall for weeks already, there was an email from the Awakened Centre. An invitation to something that Yanna had already mentioned. A get-together for newly awakened individuals. He mentally noted it to take a look later, but for now he put his phone back into his pocket. That kind of thing wasn't important right now.
"You kids ready to do this?" Alicia asked, just waiting for everyone to get ready, "Please don't use any spells or skills that use mana right now."
Ryan watched as Alicia pressed her palms together, as though she were praying. She let out a long breath at such fervour that it seemed almost impossible for her to hold it for as long as she did. Almost instantly, she stopped, and carefully pulled her hands away from each other. With a soft pink glow, a staff appeared between her hands. It was made of wood curling around itself, holding onto a round, pink bulb at its end. Alicia held that end right over the ceramic bottle in the centre of that pattern on the ground.
With a whispering, almost fading voice, the elf started to recite a chant. It was rhythmic and musical, enthralling to the point where Ryan's eyes were almost stuck to her lips as she spoke. He turned to the side, and he noticed he wasn't the only one; the other were staring right at Alicia, as if they were watching the most engaging movie ever.
By the time Ryan looked back toward Alicia, some liquid was carefully flowing out of the top of the ceramic bottle. It was fully translucent, but it seemed too thick to be water. It was just a step before gelatinous. Once out of the bottle, the liquid split up into eight parts, each forming a small bubble.
Seven of these bubbles moved to the candles, trapping their flames. But instead of extinguishing them, the liquid just made it all brighter. The walls were quickly covered in fractured light, swerving back and forth. It was like what happened when light reflected off a body of water. The last of the bubbles moved toward the two fragments of Gaia, carefully scooping them up, before carrying them to the centre of the pattern, floating just between the ceramic bottle and the tip of Alicia's staff.
The whole time as this happened, Alicia hadn't stopped her chanting for even a moment, not even to breathe. Her eyes were deeply focused on the bubble containing the fragments. Carefully, she tapped the top of the bubble with her staff, pulling the liquid up into a thin strand. Ryan's heart almost skipped a beat as he watched the reflections on the walls peel off the surfaces they were on. As if a dome was closing in on them all that the light was being thrown onto instead, the reflections floated through the air, surrounded by nothing but darkness. Before long, Ryan and the others were taken in by this darkness as well. He couldn't even see his own hands anymore. By the time he looked back in front of himself, that 'dome' had reached the magic circle on the ground, but it didn't stop there. These reflections continued on further, even beyond the candles that created them in the first place. A few moments later, the only thing that was visible in this room was the bubble containing the two fragments.
It was an almost uncomfortable darkness, one that Ryan had never seen before. It was even darker than just closing his eyes usually was. Right now, he would actually have no idea if they were open or not, if it weren't for that single ball of light dancing right in front of him. Soon, the light was pulled up the thin strand that Alicia had created earlier. Her voice, so serene and quiet as it had been, was now so deafening that it seemed like she was screaming, though in reality it was still nothing but a steady whisper.
The light soon gathered at the tip of the strand, forming a small, marble-sized ball. Ryan's eyes were deeply focused on them, as he finally started to see something else beside the light. Alicia's hands were slowly closing in around it, her pale skin illuminated by the magical lights. As if they were physical, Alicia grabbed it in her right hand. Her whispered chanting ongoing, she held it toward Ryan. He didn't even have to be told, and carefully took a step forward, taking the marble of light from her.
Out of everything that was happening, the part that truly surprised Ryan the most was that it was cold to the touch. He looked away from it, watching Alicia guide her fingers to her lips. The light of the marble was reflected in her eyes, and she was staring right at Ryan. He didn't know why, but it was like his body was acting on its own. He mimicked Alicia and placed the marble to his own lips. And then, he took piece of light into his mouths, swallowing it.
As the whispers cut out immediately, the light of the candles slowly returned and the room was filled with that soft yellow glow. A system message appeared in front of Ryan.
[You have taken in the -Light of Guidance-]
"What... what's the light of guidance?" Ryan let out, and as he spoke, he realised that he had been holding his breath up until now. At the same time, he could see the liquid move back into the bottle after placing down the two fragments. Alicia smiled at Ryan.
"It's how we can find Gaia's fragment. It's going to guide you there," she explained, tapping her head, "Just try to concentrate on it."
Ryan nodded his head, closing his eyes for a moment, trying to search for the 'Light of Guidance'. However, he didn't have to look for it for long. Inside of Gaia's domain, a small orb of light was floating. As Ryan focused on it, he could feel it practically pull him in a direction. It was perfectly to the right. To test it out, Ryan slightly turned his head. The pull of the light was still aimed in that same direction.
"Have you found it?" Alicia asked, "Now, this part might be a bit tricky, especially since you haven't awakened that long ago. You need to let go and let it pull you to where it wants you to go. It's going to feel almost like..."
"Like a very strong 'want' to go somewhere? Yeah, I think I got it?" Ryan replied, and Alicia blinked a few times in surprise.
"Wait, you already got it?"
"I think so? It's trying to pull me right over there," he pointed in the direction where the light wanted him to go. It was slightly to the right of the door.
"... Didn't you just awaken a few weeks ago?" Alicia tried to confirm, not sure if Runar maybe lied to her.
"On the 14th, yeah. I feel like I'm pretty good at handling mana, I guess. Plus, the fragment is just inside of Gaia's domain right now, so it was easy to find," Ryan explained, and Alicia clicked her tongue as she turned her head away.
With crossed arms, the elf glared at Runar, "Like uncle, like nephew, huh? Your family is just so annoyingly talented at using magic."
Muttering to herself, Alicia walked over to a bag placed on one of the couches. She pulled a scroll out of it; a full-on, proper scroll that looked like it came straight out of a movie.
"What's up with her?" Silvia asked curiously, and Runar couldn't help himself but grin as he responded.
"When she started teaching me, she would always get super annoyed at how quickly I learned the basics. She wanted to explain and teach it to me more, but I'd skip whole lessons."
Alicia narrowed her eyes and stared at Runar, "Your bloodline is cheating."
"Oh get off it," Runar scoffed, "Just open the map already."
Alicia sighed, unrolling the scroll she was holding. On it was an old, hand-painted map of what seemed to be New Riverside. It wasn't particularly detailed, but apparently quite accurate. The elven mage looked away from the map and at Ryan, "Now, place your palm on there, and act like you're pulling out the light. As you did with the fragments earlier."
"Right, just hold on," Ryan replied, quickly walking over to the magic circle that had been drawn on the ground. Gaia's two fragments were still laying there, and Ryan quickly picked them up. He pulled them back into Gaia's domain where they would be safe. They were floating just below that orb of light.
And then, Ryan came back to Alicia who patiently waited, and he placed his palm onto the map. It was rough and clearly pretty old. Ryan took a deep breath and concentrated on the light in the domain, pulling it out through his hand. He could feel the same chill that he felt when he touched the light earlier; it was like cold water was flowing down his arm onto the paper.
Alicia prompted him to put away his hand, and as he did, a small circle appeared on the map, drawn around part of the Channel's island.
