The time spent hurtling through space had disillusioned Lucifer to the concept of time. Now that she was in the gravitational pull of a star, she felt the flow of time was a lot slower.
The time spent in isolation had caused her own thoughts to slow to a crawl. Probably a defense mechanism, but largely part of her depression. Now that she had visual stimuli to take up her attention, her mind started to accelerate.
The process had started with the impact of the small asteroid, and now that she got closer and closer to the distant star, she needed more and more brainpower to figure out a way to touch solid ground. The other problem was the truly staggering amount of debris floating through space in relatively close proximity to her.
Lucifer had spent a while in the endless vacuum of the sol system, and even after 70 years of humanities littering, the space of this system was littered with objects.
Lucifer couldn't identify any objects that indicated a space age civilization, but even the amount of tiny asteroids this far from the sun was staggering.
Lucifer spent another timeless while hurtling towards the sun, trying to figure out a way to slow herself down enough to come to a complete standstill. Usually she would have enough heat stored to propel herself without aid, but the years in the void had strained her reserves. Now the only way she could see herself slowing down enough was the kinetic energy in her system.
Now that she knew what the energy itself was, observing it grew easier by a large margin. Although she did not understand it as intimately as fire itself, she had spent centuries just observing its minute details. This gave her the confidence to try her hand at manipulating it directly.
The first few weeks showed little to no results, which was frustrating to her, and chipped at the tiny flame of motivation that burned in her chest.
The first breakthrough came, ironically in the form of another small asteroid. This one did not strike her, but shot past with incredible speed, missing her face by a hair. The moment she had noticed it shoot past, it bled off a tiny amount of its own energy and transferred it to her. She knew the basics of orbital mechanics and could deduce that her own rather insignificant gravitational field had caused the transfer of energy.
With the new discovery, she continued to try and shift her kinetic energy somewhere else. As she was caught in the sun's gravitational pull, it seemed like a good idea to shift it along the connection to the sun, but it felt barely possible.
“This must be it when mortals mean brick walls” she thought to herself. The transfer of energy to the sun seemed impossible.
With every day spent practicing the sensing and manipulation around her, Lucifer began to be able to sense the kinetic energy of objects around her. At first it was barely a few centimeters outwards from her body, but over time it grew. Although at a snail's pace, it grew day by day.
A second breakthrough came when she noticed a tiny pebble float alongside her. It was barely as large as a marble and Lucifer only noticed it floating past her due to the new ability to sense kinetic energy.
Finally having something direct to occupy herself with, she snatched the rock and held it in her hand. It was a tiny marble, made of some type of rock and a tiny bit of ice that melted on contact with her.
“I shall call you Marble” Lucifer chuckled to herself, going through the proper vocalizations even without the air to make any sounds.
Now with Marble in her hand she began to experiment with the shifting of kinetic energy with a proper target in mind. Her first try was almost disastrous for her, as Marble shot into the distance as soon as she tried bleeding a bit of her kinetic energy into the small rock.
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The moment the energy left her, Marble shot in a straight line away from her. In a burst of panic, Lucifer used a bit of stored heat to add thrust to her feet and shot off after Marble.
Catching it without too much trouble, she told the tiny inanimate rock “You can’t do that Marble, we just became friends”
The next few days were spent practicing the manipulation of the tiny rock. Shooting it from her left to her right hand, causing it to orbit around her head or just shooting it from her hand, and calling it back at the edge of her perception.
And sometimes Lucifer just slept. To not lose Marble she put him in her mouth, to hinder any plans of escape he might have. Sleeping with a rock in her mouth was a new experience, but waking up to tiny asteroids smashing into her, made it a necessity.
The distance to the star was rapidly shrinking, but Lucifer had no reference points except her own memories, so she did not know if she was actually growing closer. The only difference she could feel was the ever increasing kinetic energy as the distant sun slowly but surely pulled her closer.
One day during her manipulation practice, she felt Marble break. The moment she grabbed the tiny ball of rock with the intention of pulling it towards her, it broke along a fault line. One half of the tiny rock flew in her direction, now way faster due to its reduced size, while keeping the same kinetic energy, while the other half just floated listlessly at the edge of her range.
Lucifer may have cried a bit. “Marble, I'm so very sorry, I'll fix you I promise” With the greater fine control she had achieved due to probably months of practice, she caused the other half of marble to float towards her, along with the tiny flecks of stone that had loosened along the break.
Now with both halves of marble, she pooled heat into her hand to melt the two pieces together. She could have tried pressing them by hand, but that was likely to crumble them even more.
Slowly the two pieces of rock started to melt, and as soon as they were an even temperature Lucifer pressed them together with her hands. Using the vacuum of space to help form marble into a perfect sphere.
As soon as she felt Marble was round enough, she rapidly pulled the heat from him, causing the tiny rock to turn into a proper obsidian marble.
“See, I got you back together. I even made you properly round. Take this as an apology. Im sorry marble” Lucifer muttered to herself.
Over a long time spent hurtling towards the sun, Lucifer continued practicing with Marble, now a lustrous piece of volcanic glass that would make all the other rock ladies swoon. Her fine control rose with every passing day and soon one marble wasn't enough. To not make him angry, she snatched many tiny asteroids she flew past, and only used rocks that were smaller than Marble.
At some point over fifty of the tiny rocks were orbiting around Lucifer, tracing individual paths and never colliding. When they moved past a different rock they would exchange kinetic energy amongst themselves, but never in the way they would naturally. To not make Marble jealous that she was spending time with other rocks, she used the tiny pieces of rock dust that was created whenever another of the tiny asteroids broke, to slowly make Marble bigger and bigger. Adding to his form, while keeping him perfectly spherical.
Lucifer was broken out of her trance-like state, by smashing into an asteroid. This time, instead of one that was barely more than space rocks, it was a space boulder.
Their relative speeds were not different enough to cause a large reaction, and so they just collided without one damaging the other.
Lucifer instantly felt that Marble would be jealous, and so melted the rock down to make Marble bigger. Only after Marble was as big as a large watermelon did it occur to Lucifer that she could have used the boulder to change her trajectory.
“I’m sorry Marble, but even if the next few would make you bigger, I need them to move. If i don't use them, i either fall into the sun, which you wouldn't survive, or we drift through the void endlessly, which i wouldn't survive” Feeling the rocks begrudging acceptance, she continued to float through space.
The next boulder she flew past was not large enough to step foot on, but it helped her bleed off large amounts of kinetic energy, causing it to shoot straight at the distant sun.
The longer Lucifer hurtled through space in the direction of the sun, the larger the pieces of rock grew. At some point they were large enough for her to stand on, but she didn't stay long.
Because the moment she came to a stop on the larger asteroid, she spotted something in the distance.
“Look Marble, a planet”
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They felt it first.
They knew of it first.
The others would know in time, but they felt it first.
As an aspect of the “creator deity” they knew the strings of fate like no other. The tapestry of karma that wove throughout the world was being disrupted.
They knew that if they told the “creator” they would be rewarded. But the disruption would be stopped.
They sat in absolute darkness. A pocket realm the creator had made to keep them in. They were told it was to eliminate outside stimuli, so that they may focus on their [Divination] properly. But they knew the truth. They were imprisoned.
With a slight effort of will, and a surprisingly large expenditure of mana, they wove a veil over themselves. Their mastery of karma, just barely enough to shield them from the “creator's” gaze.
In the next instant they peered along the strings of fate, looking for the disruption.
Instantly they were overwhelmed by fire. Fire, different from that of even the sun itself. The strings they were peering along snapped and burnt to metaphorical ash in milliseconds.
Their physical form caught fire for the briefest of moments, burning even the form the “creator” had hand crafted. The flames carried with them a feeling of grief, loneliness and all encompassing rage.
They looked at their hands, now scorched black, still faintly smoldering, and laughed.
They laughed for the first time in their life.
Calming themself, their eyes suddenly shone with the light of a prophecy, no one was able to hear.
“The fire of a distant star
Vengeful with a soul full of ash
Shall burn the Devils
And the gods alike
Until All that remains
Is smoke and char”