Re: Mana Spirit
Chapter 1: White Void
.
.
.
I don't know what is going on.
All I see is white.
All I sense is silent and still. Impossibly so.
Will it be like this forever?
(Unknown time later)
“@#$%^&*df@a#$%d^&*” [Unknown]
I can just barely hear someone, like a whisper. There are no other sounds, so it is distinctive.
I'm not sure where I am, but I can't feel my body. Am I paralyzed? Must be.
But, I don\'t feel anything at all. There is no heat or cold, no up or down... I'm not even sure I'm breathing!
“G$(&^@ @)$d @$!~#” [Unknown]
The voice sounds frantic. Young too. I can hear them, they are closer than before and the words clearer. It just sounds like noise, but it might be speech. There is meaning, I feel it.
Third time. I think this person is right on top of me now...
“Ghea voam gey kaltur malta yom!” [Unknown boy]
So they were words, I thought so.
Then I feel something. Like a ripple of water. It is moving away but just by touching it I am moved along with it. I'm slowly falling out of it. I think this is the boy I just heard. Am I floating in something like a wake?
I try to follow and I'm surprised because I can easily navigate much faster than he can walk. Floating along like a balloon. Just by using the ripples I know where the boy is. I hover over him. The questions are: where am I and how am I moving?
The boy's voice is loud and clear now, his words don't make much sense but somehow I think I understand them. The ripple... it seems to be acting as a go-between.
I can feel the boy noticed me. He's excited. He wants to do something... but he's scared at the same time. Deathly afraid.
Through the ripple I can see. No I think what I see in the ripple is reality as I know it. Grass. Stones. A road. What is this endless white place I currently exist in, then? The afterlife? Limbo?
I don't quite know what to think.
I can feel his urgency bleeding through the ripple.
He's running.
I get the feeling this boy is very young. I can only see through his eyes so I'm not completely sure. He might just be extremely short. Also... is he colorblind? I'm seeing in gray-scale here.
Whatever is chasing him has finally caught up.
A wolfhound-looking thing. Big teeth, attitude.
The boy's scared.
I'm not sure but I can almost sense the dog in the White Space too.
Oh, so I'm close enough to tap it's waves too?
The dog seems quite hungry... and it desires to kill and eat the boy.
Well, I'm not going near that ripple. I feel these intents vividly, I'm not a willing cannibal. Even vicariously.
Instead he stopped.
He's doing some hand gestures and saying something...
“Oh great spirit of mana, strike my enemy: Magic Arrow!” [Boy]
Uh...
“No, not again!” [Boy crying]
The wolf-thing is sprinting at him. Not good. He's going to die!
The waves, they keep pounding on me. I don't want to see and feel a child being eaten alive!
I lash out at the terrible wave. And somehow I connect. Do I even have limbs? No. I do not.
(Yipe!) [Wolf-thing]
Huh?
The wolf was blown back in reality!
“Delayed activation? It worked!” [Boy surprised]
I wasn't really watching what happened but, clearly the boy saw something.
It's limping, pacing back and forth with no intention to give up, but the wolf-thing clearly is now wary. It was just hurt by something from the boy's direction.
There. From the deepest part of me a thin arm reaches out. When I lose focus, it is gone.
I move closer to the wolf-like animal, to better pummel it.
“Great elements of air, cause my victim to slumber: Sleep Call!” [Boy]
…
I grab hold of the wolf-ripple, broad shapeless limbs flowing out from my core self, grasping it. It seems to be quite easy. My limit for this kind of thing seems quite high. I clutch it tight and force the breath from it's lungs. As it struggles I hold it until it passes out.
There. Mission accomplished.
“It worked again! I'm a genius!” [Boy]
This book's true home is on another platform. Check it out there for the real experience.
I flick his forehead, he's getting too proud.
“Ow... is this what draining all my mana feels like?” [Boy]
I flick him again.
“Uh...” [Boy tearing up] “It hurts.”
It's alright now. You're safe.
But someone really needs to talk to you about your imagination. You're acting like magic really exists.
Okay, sure I'm some kind of poltergeist... but supernatural beings and magic are different... I think.
Uh... existential questions are not my strong suit. I'll just go with the ripple... er... flow.
Well I can see why the boy would be confused if he can't see me. He might not even sense I'm here.
“Still... if I used up all my mana, why does it feel like it is still there?” [Boy confused] “Maybe... that was feedback? Yeah, it must be. The spell was too much for me. I'll stick with the magic arrow, until I can handle it.”
Hmm.
So he can sense me? Slightly.
Let's have a closer look at the ripple. It seems to be constantly moving, dragging tiny little pieces of dust to the center: where the boy is. Is that 'mana'?
Backing off a bit I'm treated to a sense of fear from the kid. He thinks he's drying up? He's out of juice?
Could it be like a scale? I'm so heavy his senses can't realize the difference between a full load of 'dust' (mana) and me? If you think about it that way, I'm kind of tricking the poor guy. It's like that old con used on gold miners, where the guy with the scales would keep his thumb on the weights to undervalue the gold brought in to be assayed?
Imagine if he thinks he's full of mana, but in reality all he has is me?
I wonder, are there negative consequences to depleted mana? Probably.
Shit. I have to put a stop to this, it will be dangerous for the kid.
Lets bailout.
“No! It's changing! My mana... it's leaking away...” [Boy crying]
Sigh.
Stop your moaning. I'll hang around, at least until you sleep. Then, fly away like the wind.
Damn. I'm going to have to do all the work around here until then. I really hope there are perks to this, because it really sucks, otherwise. People taking credit for your work, feeling the intentions of everyone. It might be quite bad if I run into someone very unpleasant. At least the kid is a straight forward guy.
Hmm. Very young though.
I wonder how young.
“Just wait mother! I'm going to cure you with this medicine!” [Boy clutching a small pouch]
(boy running down the road)
Well, I've got nothing better to do. Let's see if the story plays out like it should.
(An hour later... thankfully without hocus bogus)
Bursting into a wooden shack the boy rushes to a large bed at the far side of the room. A figure lies sprawled on the sheets, sweat drenching her clothes. She looks at him, but her eyes don't focus properly and her words are mumbled and unclear.
I don't know exactly what is wrong, but she is clearly delirious; her ripples are very abstract. Something about falling bricks and flying.
The boy feeds her the herb powder he bought. He says it's magical. I call bullshit.
I can't sense a friggin' thing from it. It's just regular medicine at best, or at worst a snake-oil sold to an eager young sucker. How do I know? Because the house has one thing in it that clearly IS magical. I can see it. It is the first thing I could see in the White Space that wasn't mana or a ripple. As a side note, the White Space is sheer white because the mana is endlessly falling like a blizzard.
A tiny locket, fallen under the floor through the boards. It has a faint touch of nostalgia to it, as if a lingering echo of a ripple sticks to it. I feel that it has some kind of soothing effect. But I have no way to test that. Or a care to, either.
(Morning light enters the squalid shelter...)
Damn kid... he would spend all night at his sick mother's side waiting for her to get better. Which isn't happening. She's crashing. I don't expect her to live much longer...
The little twerp is crying again. I hate that...
…
What we learned:
New story!
Reasonably traditional seeming magic-using world, with atypical hero.
The MC is Tsundere?!