“Oh please, protect this home and grant us fortune.” A young girl’s voice called out. I hadn’t even realized that I was ‘somewhere’. All I could sense was myself, in an empty void. My orb slowly fills with a condensation of essence, flowing to my thought and will.
Not seeing anything was an immediate problem, and I took some time to consider how I could change that. The first thing is that I could quite easily ‘see’ my own essence and myself; perhaps I could do something with that.
I practiced for a few moments moving the essence within myself. It was easy, if a bit sluggish. Feeling confident, I opened a pore in my core and allowed a droplet to escape. Much to my pleasure, the essence was very much still under my control. I willed it to spread out like a gas in infinitesimally small particulates. The essence formed into a sort of lattice all on its own. I could see!
Congratulations! You have established your first realm of influence.
Name: Oscar Willtroth
Level : 1
Race: Deity
Title: House Spirit
Essence : 2/10
Domain(s): N/A
Huh. Must be that ‘knowledge melding’ Orison mentioned. I tried to glean more but nothing seemed to happen, so I decided to focus on the moment.
In a small room with a bit of a shrine, before me was a plain, brown haired young woman, perhaps 19 years old. I was never very good with age. Either this place had a strange fascination with renaissance fashion, or this was indeed the generic fantasy realm I believed. She wore a clay-colored linen dress.
I was curious about her, and my own abilities. Wondering the extent of my perceptive abilities I concentrated my essence into observing her more directly. It moved through my domain with ease compared to before, before it spread and surrounded her and my head was overwhelmed with a headache and absolutely far too much information. In a moment I simultaneously knew everything about her, more than I knew of myself. If I could have screamed, I would have.
Warning! Too much knowledge absorbed, insufficient mental capacity. Sealing information.
And the pain, thankfully, was gone, but so too was everything I had learned, except her name. Nora. Something felt powerful about that. Names… something to consider.
I took a minute to reassess the situation, and noted that I had used my paltry store of essence completely, but while Nora paid her respects more continued to condensate. It was slow, but thankfully not that slow.
In planning for my future, I really had to figure out how to ensure I continued to get essence. It was clearly my only way of interacting with the world, and being starved of it was certainly a terrible fate. Presuming the condensation correlated with Nora’s prayer, It seemed best to find some way to ensure her faith. That was what deities were supposed to do, wasn’t it?
Nora interrupts my thoughts by standing, holding a bottle of something. She pours it into a bowl on the shrine, revealing it as wine. She presses her hands together. “The first pour of this house, in your name.”
Notification. Willing sacrifice detected. Absorb? Y/N
Obviously, yes.
Absorbing…
The wine began to drain from the bowl, to the surprise of Nora, and essence began to rapidly fill me.
Warning! Insufficient Essence capacity. Leveling up.
My consciousness was overwhelmed with sensation, stinging pain, and a subtle calm pleasure. My essence began to rip apart the orb that was me, pulling pieces apart and remaking it, larger. I faded in and out before it seemed the process was done. I immediately checked my status.
Name: Oscar Willtroth
Level : 2
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Race: Deity
Title: House Spirit
Essence : 17/25
Domain(s): N/A
Sacrifice appeared to be a rather rapid way of gaining essence, and I was quite pleased by the sum I had gained but I didn’t like the idea of asking sacrifices from my followers, at least not as my primary source of essence. I wished not to take, but to give. Regardless, that seemed something to decide on in the future. For now, I had to deal with Nora, who was currently looking at the now empty bowl with surprise. Maybe with so much essence I could speak to her.
I decided that my followers were my only source of essence, ensuring their faith was worth any price. I concentrated 15 of my remaining essence on her in an attempt to communicate with her.
Warning! As a House Spirit, there is a significant cost penalty for communicating. Are you sure you wish to continue? Y/N
I was already resolved. Yes.
My essence rapidly disappeared, and it appeared nothing happened, but Nora almost jumped. With so little essence, I was only able to allow her to briefly sense my presence. She suddenly fell to her knees and bowed down as deep as I had ever seen someone do. And it was to me. I felt a lot of feelings, some of which I definitely needed to suppress.
“O-Oh thank you, great one, for listening to my prayer!” She said, with a mix of fear and reverence. I did not like being feared. Either way, essence began to trickle in. Nowhere near as fast as the sacrifice, but if she kept it up… far more efficient.
She prayed for a few minutes before hesitantly rising, and running from the room. By the end, I had 20 essence. I decided to expand my domain, hoping I could follow her. My lattice slowly spread in every direction. As I reached beyond the edge of the home in one direction, I noticed the effort seemed to increase, so I limited myself to spreading to the rooms of the small home. About half way through the process, I found Nora speaking to someone, an older looking man in his 40s.
“I’m not sure why, but It seemed more powerful. Something more than a house spirit, and w-when I gave it the sacrificial wine, the wine disappeared!” She explained increasingly manic.
The man simply chuckled warmly. “Nora. I’m sure it’s nothing. I know coming here and everything has been a lot for you. You clearly need a bit of rest.” His tone turned soft and caring.
“I wasn’t imagining it. Come on, I can show you!” She grabbed his hand and the bottle of wine she had left on a cabinet.
He shrugged and begrudgingly followed along. “If it will put you at ease, daughter.”
In a minute they were in my shrine room and I was watching with anticipation. More essence for me!
She fell to her knees and prayed. “Oh, please, great one, allow me to offer to you again.”
Her father watched with concern, and a bit of awkwardness, shifting on his feet.
Nora paid no mind to him as she stood and slowly stepped to the shrine, pouring the wine again. I immediately accepted the sacrifice, watching it drain and filling my stores.
Warning! Insufficient Essence capacity. Leveling up.
It happened over again, less painful this time, and I noted a roughness to the growing orb that was me. I checked over my status.
Name: Oscar Willtroth
Level : 3
Race: Deity
Title: House Spirit
Essence : 11/50
Domain(s): N/A
Doing some quick math, factoring in the drain of expanding my domain it seemed the wine sacrifices provided about 25 essence.
Turning my attention back to the two at my shrine, Nora was looking a little relieved, and the father was looking rather astonished. “You weren’t kidding, were you?”
She turned back to him. “Let us talk of this outside the shrine.” She left the room. Her father followed and she closed it behind her.
“I told you I wasn’t imagining it.” She declared, clearly a bit offended by her father’s lack of faith.
Her father shifted nervously again. “W-well, what do we… What do we do? I was never the faithful sort. That was you and your m- Ahem. That was your expertise.” He caught himself, but It was obvious to put together the pieces; something had happened with Nora’s mother.
Nora looked at him with a complicated expression I didn’t really understand. Nothing good. She shook her head. “Well, first, you should pay your respects personally. Then… I don’t know. Maybe our luck is up.” She said with a weak hope, which crushed me. I promised myself I’d do everything I could to help her.
Nora’s father took a brief stop into the shrine, and prayed quietly. I noted that I gained less essence from him as compared to Nora.
I decided to stop snooping and get about my task of expanding my domain, and finishing up with the house. As I did, I got a notification.
Alert! As a House Spirit you have gained full control of a house willfully given. Your realm is upgraded automatically, increasing passive essence generation, and granting significant discounts to influencing parts of the house, especially those that can be explained away by natural causes.
Well, that was good, but I’d rather not be just a house spirit. Perhaps If I gathered enough essence I could commune with Nora and fix her misunderstanding, but I would need a lot of essence. For that, all I could do was wait.