Two knocks on the door disturbed their reunion dessert time.
“What do you think about this one?” Xin asked without context.
“Aura-wise, the Boiler Knights are superior. But on Teheil, both of them together may have a chance against a single Boiler Knight.” Ebony already figured that both of the strong warriors outside were big fishes in a small pond much like he was.
“That much? He’s the one that cut my hair in a spar and I had to trim it down to my shoulders. Do…do you not like it?” She asked while fiddling with her hair, now reaching down her back.
“It looks great on you.” His words seemed to fuel her energy and mood back up and she used it to get a little more serious.
“So what do you think our chances are?”
“Together? We can beat people like Steelbreaker, I would rate her as top 20 individuals I’ve seen on Teheil so far.” His chances alone were low but together, with opponents that can’t use magic? He didn’t see a high chance of losing to anyone except a certain few Cinderash or Ferroquad that he sensed from afar but stayed away from.
He didn’t find noteworthy Mirellans or Veilarans. Their average skill was higher than Elcra’s Knights and freelancers but not enough to stand out to Ebony and nothing worthwhile compared to a fully-fledged society of warriors like Cinderashians and Ferrquadians. The Veilarans had some unique stealth abilities and they would’ve been interesting to check out if they could use magic. The Mirellans relied very heavily on advanced weaponry and even robotics. However, the robots in general were quite insufficient and weren’t qualified to challenge any respectable warrior of the races present.
“He is angry, he doesn’t get angry. What did you do?” Xin looked at her door.
“I sealed that priestess, brought her to a farm. She’ll be tending the farms and mines for the next year. Then you can do whatever you want with her.”
“You can do that?”
“She stole the ring-necklace I gave you. That has my Will, which I’m sure Ten and Eleven depended on to survive as long as they did. It’s now her prison, like this prison on me.” He raised his bracelet. It required mana from him but he could walk away for a week or two and the ring would have enough in storage. He had been refreshing the runic moulding from a distance all this while.
“Just extend her seal period and I’ll cut one of her horns off…”
“...Sure.” He dealt what he felt was needed, if she didn’t want the High Priestess life it was also none of his business. She didn't tell him the reason she was still...amiable with this place and race but if he had to guess, it was gratitude. At least towards the general populace here and not the individuals.
As someone who had experienced extreme physical and mental pain, starving was a sensation that didn't lose out in intensity and torture. Perhaps he didn't think they were much different but to Xin, starving for months on end probably didn't do her mind and body well.
Opening the door, he saw the short 1.5 metres native with two horns and grey-furred limbs. There were scars on them that were furless, showing skin instead.
“Holy Maiden.”
“What do you want, Guardian Karnak?”
“Have this human release the High Priestess from her…doings.” Karnak’s proficiency with the Gia language was not exceptional.
“You’ll have to excuse us.” Xin pushed Karnak aside while grabbing onto Ebony’s hands, “Come, Ebony. I got gifts for you.”
“I have gifts for you too.” Ebony patted his bag. Outside of food ingredients, he had a bunch of Cinderashian specialities that could potentially refine a person’s physique. He sadly didn’t manage to learn any of the methods of extracting or making use of their energy but…he had a feeling they could just consume it or find another way themselves.
Xin pulled him forward by hand without any embarrassment. Bringing him to dusty warehouses, ordering any native that looked like they were in charge in the tongue he hadn’t deciphered. Before long, all of them would carry either crates or a jewelled box out and hand them to Xin on a cushioned platter if they could. None of them even questioned about Ebony’s presence.
“Their--faith in you is immense.” Ebony carefully chose the word that felt most fitting. It was like these people didn't know Xin ever got possessed.
“Thanks to the high priestess.” She ridiculed herself and her defeat at the native’s hands.
In his hands were items he couldn’t Appraise until he learnt the names that natives gave these ores and rocks. For people who didn’t know what ice was, he was surprised they had cold-related materials. The lack of ice mana did throw him off.
From Xin’s translation, he had his hands on Crystal Fire, the cold-related rock. Enigma Rock, a rock none of them knew what it does except produce a suction force not unlike the cushioning. Ebony knew that the Mirellans were researching this rock, their robots could use them to some degree and produce a strengthened area of cushioning. Phantal Thread, from the woolly fruit of a plant. Their clothes, namely pants, were made of this material.
The natives didn’t have a good understanding of material properties, and they didn’t have many or any advanced crafters. It was odd considering their planet was all about weird and uniquely powerful properties materials. ‘Maybe lost due to the cullings?’
Everything he was given was of Ancient-quality. Other than the crystal fire, a glowing rock full of energy he didn’t know what to do with materials like these.
“Where are we going now?” Ebony let her drag him to a less populated region, till there was almost no one around.
“Deep in this cave, unused mining quarry. Let’s pick up the speed.” Xin didn’t light a fire but they travelled in increasing darkness without an issue.
Ebony didn’t expect to spend 5 weeks travelling down, the effect of the Golden Fields seemed to spread endlessly even downwards. Minus the light.
“We’re here.” Xin broke the silence, she had been in combat mode the entire time to speed up their descent. She never let his hands go free.
“Yeah…this is blinding.” Ebony’s gravitational senses almost gave him vertigo. Considering his current mental prowess, it was unexpected, to say the least.
However, even through the vertigo he sensed a cube that couldn’t be lifted off the ground in an unsuspecting cave that glittered in his perception. It was half a metre wide, long and tall.
“During one of her attempts to raise my status, they brought me to this place to try to lift this…rock? Light doesn’t work here, natural fire on sticks doesn't seem to produce light. Normal Grandmasters would be sucked and splattered across the rock and floor when they touch it. I know gravity, but this thing doesn’t have any suction if we don’t touch it, so it isn’t wrapped up in earth. It just…sits here after their mining cleaned off the earth around it. Together with the two guardians and my strongest augmentation, we couldn’t lift it.”
Ebony knew better since he could perceive, but the cube was partially unearthed. The miners must have died while unearthing or hitting off chunks of earth around this cube.
“I would expect that. The mass of this cube is…well, I can’t lift it either. Magic or not.” Ebony ran simulations but this cube was producing variable degrees of gravitational pull.
“So it really is a cube. They only guess from touch since we are blind here.”
“Didn’t they find any other cubes, smaller and lower quality around?”
“Nope, this is the only one.”
“I guess it absorbed all other parts of the same material. Give me some time to play with this.”
The tale has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the violation.
“I’ll take a nap here, wake me up if anything happens. I don’t think any monsters exist around this cube.” She yawned and stepped to the side, pulling a bed out of nowhere. She finally allowed her exhaustion to catch up. The past few weeks of her not willing to let him go was just enough for her to gather her thoughts and feelings.
Ebony touched the cube and felt a dragging force tug at every cell in his body the instant he touched it. ‘That is some crazy force. I would've been splattered and torn apart if I didn’t have coagulated mana augmenting me. It is quite big so I don’t think it’s anywhere as dense as a theoretical black hole but, probably the mass of millions of mountains. As heavy as Earth? I could be completely wrong due to the variable strength it’s producing and the fact I’m still in one piece. My gravitational perception isn’t good enough.’
Thinking of ways to take this cube away, he was quite helpless. The size and mass of Teheil was incomparable to the Earth he knew. Regardless of earth quality and the presence of mana and various magical energies in effect, there was no way he was lifting something like this.
Not giving up, it was a fun game to test his gravitational manipulation right here and now. The strength of his gravity spells had always depended on how much gravity mana was in his range and control. Now, a vast amount of mass was compressed into a cube he could hug within his arms. It was gravity mana galore, and this was ignoring any other unique properties it could have.
‘If I can bring this around…or put it inside Dusk or Aegis. Damn. That’s a good idea.’ Ebony knew he had a mental radius of more than 400km, as much as that sounds, it honestly wasn’t much when it came to the strength of gravity.
Of course, it was different once he compressed that into a spell but the volume of gravity mana was always an issue. The further away he pulls in gravity from, the more mana it costs him, the more time it would take to drag that mana towards him, and the longer his spells would take to fully form.
This cube alone solves all that, and it was separate from the planet he was on, it was an extremely dense cube with a volume of gravity mana that he couldn’t even measure right now.
‘Can I break it into smaller pieces? Even a fingertip’s worth would contain more gravity mana than my entire mental reach can grasp…’ Ebony hesitated to try breaking this material. Natural ores in their original state tend to have better use when they are larger. If he could break it, it would be far harder to combine them in future without the right technology or skill.
‘No point in thinking so hard.’ Ebony drew Icicle and whacked the cube as hard as he could and the result was expected. Not a scratch could be found on the cube and Icicle snapped in two.
Apologising, he held the two pieces of Icicle together and sent his coagulated mana through to mend it. The wood regrew and bound themselves together quickly.
‘Gravity manipulation it is.’ He practised manipulating seemingly endless amounts of gravity mana that flowed very differently from what he was used to, the cyclic motion that any body of mass emits. This cube’s gravity mana was moving in a different pattern!
Ebony believed there was a pattern despite the current chaotic motions he was sensing. Moreover, it doesn’t leak till he touches the cube. The cube was attacking him, either actively or passively. Interestingly enough, it doesn’t attack Icicle or the earth touching it.
If his mental range of gravity mana was akin to manipulating bathtubs of gravity mana, there was now an ocean of it in front of him and the ocean doesn’t have gentle waves and tides but unique currents and whirlpools instead.
Ebony put the simulations of battle aside, reallocating all his mental processing power to gravity manipulation and simulations of various other methods of observing, analysing and controlling the gravity in this cube.
It took surprisingly little effort to understand the motions of gravity mana in the cube. The cube as a whole had rooms or focal points within them. He didn’t understand the purpose but the gravity mana moved in a maze-like motion passing through these focal points.
He hypothesised that it was a logical circuit that determined the strength of pull, the actions it took against natural elements around it amongst other properties such as assisting the pull of gravity of the planet itself to lodge itself in the earth. He also found threads of gravity mana that spread further underground and around its surroundings, either scouting or binding itself down further.
This cube absorbs every other cube of the same material, that’s why it is the sole cube present. One thing he was unsure of was if Teheil was still producing more of this material or helping this cube grow. It was very likely.
‘If I just wait, I can probably wait till an Inferior or Common one grows in real-time. Interrupt this cube by cutting off a section of its gravity threads and locating the new cube of far smaller mass and density. Oh, it’s already happening.' Ebony almost forgot that the entire planet’s energy was siphoned into the Golden Fields and he didn’t have to wait long before something happened.
Caught off guard, he didn’t manage to get the small cube forming within earth before the stretch of threads this cube had tangled the freshly born cube and incorporated it into itself. It was practically the cube’s domain down here and out of Ebony’s element. However, the cube was not alive as far as Ebony could tell. It was not something with a spirit.
Merely hours later, he faced success. A bit due to luck for his success was born right under his feet, he dislodged the cube with a Quake Kick since he also sealed the movements of gravity around him. Losing to an inanimate cube wasn’t happening again.
‘I can’t Appraise it since there’s no light but I can assume it’s Inferior ranked, as all newborns are. Even materials.’ Ebony doubted the rock was raised in quality from Inferior to Common within a second, Golden Fields or not.
Inferior-ranked materials were equivalent to unclassed and also equivalent to tier 1.
‘It’s not light but…not enough.’ The perfect cube less than a fifth of a centimetre cubed volume was almost as heavy as his sword, which was dense, but grossly inadequate for his needs. With this as a reference, he probably vastly underestimated the mass of the huge cube due to the natural properties and control the big cube had.
‘If I just reverse a small amount at its base?’ Ebony already tidied and unearthed the entire cube with vibrations shattering the earth around it. Despite the immense density of the cube, the earth was not collapsing. The cube was placed on a sharp point, not its flat base. It was evidence that the maze-like motion of gravity within the cube was preventing this cube from having its mass act on the surface it was on.
Hence, Ebony’s interruption and reversion of gravity achieved nothing. The cube naturally fended off the interruptions with stabilisation. This cube did not want to move.
‘This is just a complicated puzzle.’ Ebony found himself enjoying the difficulty of this puzzle. Over the next week, he collected more Inferior cubes and they naturally combined themselves when they were placed near each other. When he combined a hundred, it got a significant mass increase all of a sudden. He assumed its rarity was raised to Common.
Xin was tired of the dark and they started on their ascent. Ebony brought along his new toy. It had a different flow within it so he could study this for now. It was too bad he hadn’t even finished analysing every pattern the large cube had to offer so he didn’t have the complete picture of the maze and puzzle.
Ebony placed a Will node inside a metal ring he crafted on the spot with some metal he found lying around. He wasn’t sure what metal it was but it could contain his Will and coagulated mana just fine so he made a couple dozen of them with the raw ores he found.
As they left the area, he tossed one of the rings every so often and embedded them into the earth. This way, he could have his senses reach this place from wherever he went and recharge the mana and Will they require to run. Only the ring near the cube had the analysation capability while the rest were just range nodes. Although the nodes’ consumption should have been low, this was Teheil.
Coagulated mana didn’t exactly traverse comfortably so he might not be able to reach this deep but he had to try.
Sadly, he wasn’t even halfway up when he realised the mana wouldn’t survive the trip. Project temporarily abolished.
When they were surfacing, he noticed the High Priestess was waiting at the cave entrance with both their Guardians flanking her and who seemed to be a maid or servant standing behind them. Having been weeks, Ebony’s mana and seal had long run out thanks to Teheil’s interference.
“They are waiting for us. My mana ran dry.” Ebony regained some personal space after she practically glued her arm around his for days on end.
“I’m not trying to pry but, how are you even using magic? Surely Will is not enough to do that…” They were walking slowly, not rushing to exit.
“Will is a small part, it's mostly thanks to the stability of mana. Makes it harder to break down, harder to absorb. Although I’m wary of other Domain mages, I highly doubt them to be a threat unless they also have the same trait for their mana or their Will is so strong that Teheil can't even rip a single ounce of mana from them. Which is also extremely unlikely, stable mana makes it harder for the user to utilise as well. As for having extremely strong Will, if there's anyone I suspect it would be the presence of Saints but I've haven't even sensed one other than their initial probe when I entered Central. And if there really were such people, why would they come to Teheil when strong warriors or useful technology is easier to obtain and more expendable?” Ebony was more curious about how to get out of Teheil.
Coming to Teheil made use of a portal but going out was completely different. Unless the portal technology was far more advanced than he could imagine. There was a reason why both of them hadn’t made use of the portals they came through. Xin didn’t even come through a portal, she had been sent near a portal by Ezekiel the space user. The ‘portals’ were more akin to spatial landmarks and anchors that spells, technology and mages could make use of.
‘If Xin’s mana is also absorbed, that would mean she probably reallocated her power to vitality. So her advantage on Teheil is more pronounced compared to other races excluding the natives. Without the high priestess controlling her, is my advantage bigger than hers? Yeah, pretty much.’ Ebony's simulated battles showed him one victory after the other under the conditions of Teheil.
Phantom’s Flicker was ridiculously advantageous for him. The stronger the cushioning force, the greater his advantage against her.
Xin went on about all the weird ingredients that she found while they headed up.
He listened intently but suddenly interrupted her with a chuckle when he thought about something.
“What’s so funny?” She skipped in front of him and walked backwards.
“Oh, I was just thinking how just about anyone on the planet would be killed if the rock below were to fall on them in the right place.” Ebony found it fascinating that a single rock could kill him if it fell correctly on his head and chest but few if not no individuals on the planet could achieve the same thing.
The fit of giggles that echoed in the cave seemed to agree with him.