The two fell silent again, for a time, but then the two began chatting again, excitement having them rapidly speaking on a variety of topics. They considered their future and all the permutations of it, working together well, even seamlessly as their spirits continued to grow as one. The conversation shifted to more serious topics as they considered what to do with Telnia. Ultimately, it was Joe’s decision, so both considered how to support him depending on the choice he made, but both confessed that they were rather happy with Joe’s quick rejection.
In the middle of their conversation, Gwenvair’s mother returned, the slime core in her hand. She slipped it to her daughter and with that interruption, the realized they were the last ones in the lounging room. Gwenvair’s mother warned them to sleep quickly and she turned, escaping to her sleep as well, dark circles already forming under her eyes.
Both offered their goodnights and then headed back to Gwenvair’s room where they continued their conversation for another few bells before both succumbed to exhaustion. Kilniara gave a quick hug to Gwenvair before fleeing back to her room and collapsing on her bed. I should take a bath, but…
Exhaustion dragged at her eyes and finally she found herself unable to really stay awake, the excitement of the day before leaving her rather exhausted. She lay in her bed for a bit, considering her choices before she grinned with some lascivious glee and quickly slipped into a rather modest sleep-ware. Pulling a cloak around her, she slipped out of her room and slid down the hallway to Joe’s. She entered to find him sleeping deeply, exhaustion easy to see in his sprawled out collapse on the bed. His blanket had been thrown from him and her smile softened as she slipped up to the side of the bed, shifting the blankets around until they covered him. He shifted, seeming to grow more comfortable with the warmth, and Kilniara sighed as she stared at him for a time. Her smile softened some more before she finally draped the cloak over the chair in the room and slid into the bed by his side, falling asleep almost immediately and not waking until morning.
* * *
The Matriarch strode into the room, her soft joy shifting and being swamped by the need to conduct business. She’d just returned from visiting her daughter where she picked up the slime core, joyous to see that Gwenvair was so happy on her new journey. Time to uncover our enemies. The boss slime core she had just gotten from her daughter was in her hand as she gazed around the room at the various advisors. She did not pause, marching straight onward to her seat before sitting. All fell silent and looked upon her as she waited. Finally, she lifted the slime core, six central knots easily identifying it as a boss slime and the room grew silent, shock, awe, greed, and hero worship for the missing eccentric stuttering through all minds in various measure. The Matriarch simply stared on for a time.
“It’s not natural. It is a forced growth,” the Matriarch spoke as she leaned forward and set the core down cautiously on the table.
Gasps echoed around the room with many startled glances as all the advisors stared at one another.
“Forced growth?”
The Matriarch nodded, “See for yourself. The eccentric was… kind to retrieve the core without any damage.”
Many eyes narrowed at that, thoughtful, while the spymaster ignored that and simply reached out for the core, holding it up to the light to stare at it carefully. He inspected it for some time while whispers and arguments flashed around the edges of the table before he, too, nodded and set the core down on the table.
“Forced growth. It must be. The core is too odd.”
One member shook their heads, “The eccentric could have damaged it in his fight!”
Another who was now looking at the core closely shook their heads even as the first was speaking before replying, “No. I have never seen a core damaged in this fashion. One almost perfected and undamaged knot while all others are… quite ruined, very badly ruined. This is… very unusual.”
Another member sitting beside and staring at the core nodded as well, “It… is very strange to see a core damaged so disparately. Damage is normally distributed equally across the whole core. Always. I... have never seen a core like this.”
“Unless it is forced growth,” the Matriarch interjected, “This one has five badly damaged knots, seemingly damaged separately from the first and the first is… it almost looks like a perfect core.”
A breath of a sigh wafted through the room at that, sadness at the loss of a perfect core and surprise that they might be seeing one personally even now.
The narrative has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the infringement.
“To see it ruined,” sighed the last but the Matriarch quickly cut that line of thought off.
“We are not here to discuss the core, but the ramifications of a forced growth in a tide where we have rarely seen even a Great monster. And this with a weak tide master!”
The entire room quieted at that, all falling silent and sober, the ramifications easily understood.
“We are being targeted, Matriarch,” the spymaster made it abundantly clear to all.
The Matriarch nodded firmly, “We are, and we must expose who!”
All stiffened at the Matriarch’s firm tone and then devoted themselves to a long night and discussion.
* * *
Joe woke with a deep sigh, eye’s opening and taking in the dim light of morning filtering into the room. Kilniara’s hair lay in front of him, his nose buried into her hair. The smell wasn’t exactly pleasant but neither was it unpleasant. I… didn’t bathe last night, did I? I don’t think I did… Right? Yeah… I didn’t… That’s… just gross… I fell asleep without bathing! Ugh… Ok. New plan for tonight. Bath and practice… seems better. Joe wasn’t surprised that he’d fallen asleep without bathing, the physical labor was so intensive that thought of it easily escaped his mind. Still need to make sure I bathe… just… hygiene!
In any case, Joe wasn’t really bothered by it, although he did find it distressing how stinky all of them likely were, since he found himself spooning Kilniara. Huh… they must only bathe when I make them… gonna have to work on that. Joe’s thoughts wandered for a few moments but then were quickly jerked back to the moment as he found his current situation to really be quite pleasant. Joe took the time to enjoy holding her in his arms for a few moments before pulling away as he found his control growing slack. He shifted on his back with a soft sigh before grimacing and turning himself back to his training. Soon, mana and magic points flew through the air around him as he played with them as best he could, following the exercises he’d planned.
When he’d emptied his personal mana and hit about fifty percent mana in his mana points, Joe stopped practicing and rested. His thoughts turned heavy as he began to dwell on what it meant that tai chi existed here. It was a quandary that Joe found himself stuck on. If Earth was the source of tai chi, then how did it get here. I’m not really sure, but I don’t think it started much earlier than a thousand AD… maybe even fifteen hundred? So then who came here in the past five hundred… thousand years? There’s no way that anyone who came here came and spread trillions of quadrillions of humans all across the entire galaxy… The only thing that really makes since if Earth was seeded by the humans here… besides… human history on earth is easily seen to go back tens of thousands of years, at least! So… what… it’s not just a one time thing… it’s an interchange? They … we… came to Earth some hundred thousand or more years ago… well… no… that wouldn’t make sense… they would have been incredibly developed as well… meaningful civilization is only tens of thousands of years old, so… if they did come hundreds of thousands of years ago… where are the civilizations… or… did they come within just a ten or twenty thousand years… and… what about only humans? Where are all the other variety of species? Everything I see around here is such a variety and intermingling of all species… So why are only humans left on Earth? Did only humans come? But… that doesn’t seem… Joe’s thoughts cut off when Kilniara groaned and shifted, rolling over to look up at him, snuggling into him.
“Thinking too hard,” she grumbled.
“Am I?” Joe chuckled.
“I can feel the heat.”
Joe laughed, finding the comment humorous but then realized she might be serious. She is cold blooded… probably much more sensitive to heat.
“Really?”
Kilniara grumbled, “Hmm… a little… mostly a joke.”
Joe laughed in reply but did find it a bit impressive, “But you can actually feel the slight heat difference?”
“Just barely… don’t worry… and your head’s always much hotter anyway… I like it.”
Joe snorted at that, “Not many girls like me for being a hot head.”
Kilniara didn’t respond, simply staying in his arms, and after a bit, Joe realized she’d fallen asleep again, and he returned to his practice, his system MP having refilled and his mana points having recovered a bit. He practiced with his system mana first, spending a bit more time on it and not wasting too much of it so as to allow his mana points to recover. After the last couple of weeks of practice, Joe had come to gain quite a bit more control, able to now release mana without too much effort, although he still had to grunt and force it out for the first release each morning, but soon remembering the new muscle memory formed. It was still fumbling badly at a faucet, but it did come out now without full body effort. What he really struggled with now was more of controlling the exact amount. So, he’d decided to begin practicing that as well.
Right… let’s do… a tiny stream… and … of course… massive overpowered stream. Right… less… less… less… less. Joe sighed when he’d gotten the mana output to reduce to what he’d originally intended. Right… one more time. Off… and… tiny stream… Joe frowned when the tiny stream turned out to be more of an intermittent weak leak… a tiny drop every couple seconds. He sighed. Ok… so… more… more… more… mor… GAH! A massive jet sprang outwards, spraying into the sky like a fire hose and he immediately shut it off. It was getting really irritating that he couldn’t adequately calibrate exactly what he wanted. The only thing that he seemed to be able to do consistently was to increase or decrease from the current amount. He really couldn’t get the exact amount or the exact amount of increase or decrease either. So… random… or… feels like it!
Joe continued working on his control until he’d emptied his system MP, then continued on into his personal MP, feeling the clench of exhaustion and soreness as he pushed beyond. His control didn’t improve… nor did it even feel like it did, but he kept trying, hoping that he could figure it out. Once his mana was exhausted, he turned back to his mana points, almost all of which had recovered to above ninety percent. Some even to full, which… Wait… why are some filling faster than others? Are they? I’m pretty sure I emptied them all the same… right? I think it did… gotta add that to the test… maybe? Hmm..