The combination of Beast Mage Soul and Magister’s Body had become the foundation for my role as a beast mage, which I was embracing with gusto. More than that, it acted as a powerful support for all of my magic – every single spell in my mana-garden intersected with them, in some way or another.

Their existence had paved the way for the beastmark to evolve into an actual, real, new gate, and since my mana and energy were intertwined, provided a way for me to build up basically every aspect of my body’s energy.

The point where they came together was the part that pulled my soul to directly influence my body, and though I’d made more progress on transitioning in the past few months than I’d expected to in two years of following the more normal methods.

And the magic had been marked by resolve in some strange way that I didn’t understand. I didn’t know how to activate the roots running through my magic, but they were there nevertheless, and the large root was twined into the connecting point.

I reached within myself, to the empty space over my third gate for space, and to the empty space within time, then hummed.

I could see an argument for either one being a good choice. I had both Spatial Anchors and Captured Moments within myself, after all, and both helped me cast those spells on myself easier. This could well do something similar.

I considered the magic that leaked from my chest in a slow but constant trickle, slowing the rate at which I recovered my power.

If anything could speed the rate of mana recovery, it would be time.

Of course, that was just a shot in the dark. Even Meadow couldn’t predict what the exact effects of a bond were going to be.

I reached for the connection between my full gate spells, and drew up the emptiness of the unformed bond. The roots and mycelium both sunk into time, and I felt temporal power, mana and energy blended until they were indistinguishable from one another, rush through my body, through the veins around my heart, through the veins that pumped blood, through my mind and bones and even through my semi-tangible tail.

Then it passed into my spirit. It swept through my mana-garden, the most basic and accessible part of the soul, but then it kept going. This was harder to feel, and staring into the sensation of my own soul was like looking into a fractal pattern that reflected inwards forever, but at the same time, was young and new, and ready to fold in on itself a thousand more times.

For a moment, I was aware of my entire body and spirit all at once.

Then the sensation faded.

The first thing I felt was the time that flowed into my full-gate spells. It wasn’t much, but I felt them…

I was tempted to call it growing faster, but that wasn’t quite right. My spells were growth spells. They were designed to grow as I pushed them. Each time I drew on power from them, it would recover stronger.

It was that second part, where the spells recovered stronger, that had improved.

The energy circuits that the beast mage’s soul held, which gradually expanded to contain more energy, as well as the free floating power that flowed through the flesh, bone, and blood of my body that the Magister’s Body drew on to add into my casting would both recover somewhat faster.

It wasn’t much, no massive surge of instant gratification like the Alter-Truffles had been, nor as dramatic as the churning that happened when I enforced them with drops of deep mana, but it was steady. A slow but minor benefit that could run in the background without thought or conscious effort from me.

That was the minor part of the effect, like the neat and orderly paths of blue crystal from Kene’s bond to Siobhan.

The broad impact of the effect was, unfortunately, not a cure to the mana leakage problem, nor even a boost to the rate at which I restored my already slow to recover time mana, burdened by two spells as it was.

Instead, I felt an aperture open within the twisting mycelial and oaken roots of my full gate spells, a hollow knot that could hold a vast sea of my energy-mana blend within it. It could hold easily fifty times more than all of the free flowing power that Magister’s Body could call upon and what the magical circuits created by the Beast Mage’s Soul held, put together.

But that was looking at it as a whole, which it wasn’t.

It was all in specific, strange ratios.

Taken from Royal Road, this narrative should be reported if found on Amazon.

It took time most of all, but there was a staggering amount of creation, life, and death energy required, while only the tiniest touches of desolation energy were needed. Everything else was in balance, with some aspects needing more, like telluric, and others less, like abnegation.

The space that had opened was entirely open and begging to drink up my power, but it didn’t feel like my Testudinal Reserve or Temporal Basin spells, like I could take the power when I needed it.

Just to experiment, I fed some life into it, then tried to pull it out. The hollow space accepted the power greedily, and within the hollow, I could feel it compressing, spinning, condensing towards a purpose… just not one I understood.

I tried to activate the power in the hollow space, forcing my will onto it, but the hollow refused to budge. It was empty, and it would only activate when it was full.

Even with my ability to pull magic from my plants, filling up this hollow would take a considerable amount of time.

I opened my eyes to find Meadow studying me.

“What?” I asked, a bit self consciously.

“It’s interesting,” she said. “I’m not a knowledge mage, able to analyze your powers, or a death mage, able to peer inside your spirit, but I am a life mage, and your body and soul are… interestingly linked.”

Kene’s eyes were glowing as they leaned in and studied me.

“An empty space for a second body and… spirit maybe? Is it like a simulacra?” they asked. “A body puppeteered by a motive spirit?”

“I don’t think so,” Meadow said.

The ratio clicked into place, and I realized exactly what it was. Like Kene had said, the ratio was enough for a second copy of my body and a semblance of my spirit – at least, the surface levels. It was no perfect copy of a soul or anything like that, but even with my own spells pulling my soul into my body, that was also only the surface layers, not the infinitely refracting depths.

It needed more power for all of the functions that were vital, the energy bound up in my body too tightly for me to draw on. I could draw on the tempest energy in my lungs, and it would leave me short of breath, but I couldn’t draw on so much it rendered me unable to breathe.

But it wasn’t making a copy.

No, it was more like the arrays within the emperor’s tree, the ones that, now that they’d hit third gate energy density, could be used to heal by dragging forwards the echo of health into the body.

This was similar.

“A life saving measure,” I said reverently. “It will activate when I’m hurt enough that I might die, and it’s got enough power to restore my body and mend some of my spirit. Pull me back together when I’m on the verge of death.”

“Restore or even replace,” Meadow said. “It is a time based ability, so it’s likely going to call upon the echo of the last time you were at full bodily strength and health.”

Kene punched me in the shoulder – gently.

“Ow!” I complained.

“Your abilities are so much better than mine!” he said.

“In my defense,” I said. “You two complained a lot about me almost killing myself. I’ve done it several times. This will help me stop.”

Meadow chuckled at that and shook her head.

“I don’t think it will,” she said. “I think it’ll give you another excuse to throw yourself into danger even more.”

Dusk whistled that she agreed with Meadow.

I glared at all of them, then sighed.

“Maybe,” I conceded. “But it’s not set in stone!”

“Nothing ever is,” Meadow conceded.

I stood from the bench and stretched out. All of the work – opening new gates, exploring all the changes to my mana-garden, and bonding my full-gate spells – had left me hungry.

Kene, Meadow, Dusk, and I all got some food from a street vendor, some sort of wrap that was loaded with meat and vegetables, and seasoned heavily with cayenne and long pepper, then Kene had to leave to take the closing shift at the pharmacy they were working at, Siobhan bounding alongside them.

I removed the strange hourglass like artifact that Edgar had given me and glanced at Meadow.

“There’s still a few minor things I need to take care of before I can get a chance to work on spellcraft,” I said. “Mind watching over me?”

Meadow gestured for me to go ahead, so I activated the artifact. A moment later, I was drawn into a blank space.

It was strange – it wasn’t black, nor white, nor gray. It was an utter void of color, a colorlessness that hurt my head to even think about.

It took several long moments, but then a massive tortoise appeared in the space alongside me. A craggy, turtle smile spread across his face and he rumbled a laugh.

“Ah, Malachi,” he said. “You’re healed enough to look at the bond already? Impressively quick. You must have a resilient soul.”

I coughed as I thought about all of the things I’d thrown my soul through.

“Something like that,” I said. “But yes! It went even better than I thought it would…”

It took me some time to fill Edgar in on all of the effects, and by the time I had finished, Edgar was doing the turtle equivalent of a slack-jawed stare.

“What?” I asked, shifting slightly.

“You bonded to detonating power and nearly killed yourself, so perhaps I shouldn’t be surprised,” Edgar said. “But still, I’ve never seen a result so… extreme… before. Are you going to be in Chrysite?”

“Probably,” I said. “Assuming I have time, I will. I’m not entirely sure how long my partner has before the hag and them hit a tipping point.”

If I had the time, I’d absolutely go, even if I didn’t sign Orykson’s deal.

But not if it took away too much time on Kene’s limited clock.

“I’m afraid I can’t help you much there,” Edgar said. “But if you do visit, then you should come and see me. I have a spell that I believe you would be uniquely situated to take with your beastgate mana. It’s not quite the same as my hudau mana, but it is close.”

“Oh?” I asked, and a mysterious twinkle entered Edgar’s eye.

“It’s only first gate, but it’s uniquely suited to us,” he said.

I squinted at Edgar.

“You’re being vague and mysterious on purpose, aren’t you?” I asked, and he let out a rumbling laugh.

“Perhaps. But I do so for good reason – more than one of my kind’s eggs were stolen to create magical items or pills that use this technique.”

I felt a touch of sadness at that and reached out a hand to put it on his snout.

“I’m sorry, Edgar.”

“It is not your fault, little one,” he said. “Our time grows short. Let us discuss your gate some more…”

We spoke about the gate some more, but eventually, the spell wore thin, and I appeared in the grass with Meadow and Dusk once again.