Elijah didn’t get much of a chance to test out what his new Spell was supposed to do. After sleeping for ten hours in the blink of an eye, and still feeling tired after that fact, he had been forced to sort out his last stacks of supplies and get it all loaded up on the prepared wagons. The time had come for their departure, and that meant gathering everybody up. Hardly a time to be cooped up in a laboratory and make small tests of his new abilities.
I hate this.
“Cheer up now,” Aleksi commented, giving him a clap on the shoulder before the giant helped the servants put up the final boxes on the second wagon. Since they were now a group of six people traveling, a single one had seemed a little too cramped for their tastes. And, since Elijah had forced them to invest in sleeping mats that didn’t kill his back, they would’ve needed it regardless. Luxury took up space. “That should do it. Everybody else ready as well?”
Most of the others confirmed as much, though the one from Louis was muted. The younger prince had adorned simpler attire, moving from his preference of gold-lined outfits to something more casual. It wasn’t the type of outfit found in the middle class, but it wasn’t as expensive looking as the richer snobs would accept wearing either. Elijah wouldn’t be surprised to find a merchant wearing the same, at least. Functional but still a little fancy, if those silver and brown fabrics had anything to say.
“Remember to stick to the common roads, no matter what suggestions you’ve been given,” Vera reminded them, the Queen speaking in low tones as she so graciously bid the party farewell. While this entire operation was meant to be discreet, somebody had blabbed and they’d needed to make it look more formal to those looking at it from a distance.
Elijah could tell how much Vera hated her dress. It was one of the few things stopping him from trying to get a few extra hours of sleep inside the front wagon already.
“We went over it yesterday ten times. I don’t think I can forget it anymore,” Louis replied with his usual enthusiasm. Vera’s expression softened a little at the words. “I remember all the precautions as well. Don’t worry.”
“It’s hard not to worry about family,” Vera said, making the prince roll his eyes. “Just remember to be careful, alright? I care more about your safety than the relationship with Ethon.”
“Sure you do,” the prince countered dryly, making Elijah wonder how this was going to end. The words said some weeks ago hadn’t been entirely forgiven just yet. “... I’ll write.”
With that, the prince ordered them to roll out, the horses obeying the orders as they moved the wagons away from the castle and down the streets of Kulvik. Everything normally crowded had been emptied to let them pass through easily, but that didn’t stop people shouting from a distance. Elijah tuned it out, but the others seemed more curious about it.
“Why do they need to ask for our hand all the time?” Jack asked, making Elijah glance back at the young man seated behind him. They’d been messing around with some metal casing that had been worked on in the smithy yesterday, though it was half-hearted now. “They barely know about us outside of rumors. Not really the greatest foundation for marriage.”
“You’ll be surprised at how little it takes for some to go down on one knee,” Aleksi countered. “I remember in the old days when people would propose in the bars to people they met that night, drunk and barely able to stay balanced. Hectic times and the spirit of it doesn't seem to have faded in the slightest.”
“Now they’re just drunk with greed rather than booze,” Elijah added. Jack kept up the discussion, he and the giant happily chatting away about it while Sasha made the rare comment.
Elijah didn’t partake, busy trying to guide the horses down the main street while dealing with Dawn.
‘The ground is being weird,’ the duck in question commented from inside him. ‘It’s shaking.’
At first, he thought she meant the shaking of the wagon, but a few seconds more allowed him to realize the truth. It wasn’t a Dungeon Break, the shaking wasn’t a physical sensation. It was more… a sign of eyes that tried to reach further out than normal. The Entity, the soul of the Dungeon, was trying to look their way. Normally that would be impossible this far out, but it was as if they were being assisted.
Because they were, in a way. Elijah could feel it when his Core received a wave of energy, one that automatically bounced back into the ground.
‘You’re weird,’ Dawn commented when she too felt the connection to the Dungeon strengthen. Driving through the middle-class district, and therefore closer to the entrance to the depths, seemed to have helped stabilize the bond into something somewhat usable. ‘Too big.’
‘I have to be big,’ the Dungeon replied. ‘How else would food walk inside?’
‘... Elijah, can I be big?’
‘No.’
Out of all the things this morning would include, he hadn’t expected it would be the Dungeon being a bad influence.
‘How am I bad? It is simple logistics.’
'Exactly! Being big would be best!’
‘If you get much bigger than you are right now, it would be hard to bring you places,’ Elijah reminded the duck floating around his Core in excitement. That seemed to die down a little as she imagined the concept of being stuck in one place permanently. ‘No more trips.’
…
‘Dungeon, you are a bad influence.’
‘Such a human response,’ it replied. ‘Don’t die while away. I can’t bring you back elsewhere.’
‘We’ll try not to,’ Elijah assured the sociopathic entity, trying not to dwell on the implication of its words as they continued outside of where they could communicate freely.
Not long after, the small caravan had left behind the city. The guards hadn’t stopped them at the gates, but their eyes had tracked the group long after they had left. Most knew about their departure by now, a risk by itself.
At least Harper had confirmed through their writings that people who saw an opportunity had been stopped from leaving Kulvik. Vera had made sure nobody would try to trail them. The last prince wasn’t to die from such an obvious mistake.
“A bright sun, little to no clouds, mildest of winds, and nobody to share the road with,” Aleksi listed off when they got past the first minor hill, the noise of the city impossible to discern anymore. “Ideal conditions to travel, I’d say.”
“Yes, but that fantastical sight brings its own problems,” Elijah said, before bringing out the prepared Firebloom cream. Taking out a small bit with a finger, he threw it at the other two in the wagon. “Put this on, or you’ll get sunburnt. That cloth might shield you well enough for a few hours, but it won’t be many days before your skin turns red without this.”
Elijah noted the cold sensation as he applied it, using a bit of Mana afterward to accelerate the process so he could move on. Going from their original plans, they had eight hours of traveling for the day before they made camp.
If the trip had been shorter, they might have pushed it an hour or two more, but making 12 days of travel 10 made little difference and it would only hurt the horses in the long run. Even if they were bred for the royal forces, and could handle stress beyond what most other animals would break at, there was no reason to put that to the test.
‘You can come out now,’ Elijah sent Dawn, the duck appearing on his shoulder that same second. She needed a moment to balance herself, but she managed in the end, looking at the grass landscape with her own eyes. ‘Not a bad sight, right?’
‘No lakes,’ Dawn commented. ‘Are we going to see one soon?’
‘I don’t think there’s one on the route, sadly,’ he confessed, though he didn’t exactly know the route they were taking. He’d been told the general paths, but which branches they would take were up to their discretion when they got there. ‘But if it’s water you want to see, I can assure you we’ll be seeing a lot of that at the port.’
‘There’s a big lake?’
‘I suppose you can think of the ocean as such. It’s saltier than the usual lakes. Different smells as well.’
‘Is it tasty?’
‘Not to human tongues, but… we’ll see if it’s the same for you.’
That thought kept Dawn occupied while Elijah settled in for the long ride ahead. If they had so many days to work with, days where he wasn’t burdened by tending to people needing medical attention, he was going to do his best to progress his magical abilities.
You might be reading a pirated copy. Look for the official release to support the author.
The book Alin had gotten him still sat in his bag, ready to be read through, but… the mystery of his new Spell was more important to him. Being Tier 4 made it a curiosity beyond what his previous abilities could dream of, but the most important fact was that the library didn’t have anything about it.
A library that harbored knowledge of nearly all Affinities up to Tier 8, the peak of what humans could usually reach, didn’t possess anything about a Tier 4 Spell.
The limited information about Jack’s Affinity wasn’t too big a surprise, since his gift apparently hadn’t been seen in any human kingdom these past thousand years. Sasha’s Affinity having no documentation? Very shocking, but the world stepping away from the usual naming scheme made it clear it was abnormal anyway. Ultra-rare affinities existed, and human libraries regarding the magical arts were limited by the amount of time they’d been allowed to document historical occurrences.
But for Elijah, the Biomancer? Without a doubt, there had to be over a dozen Biomancers currently living quiet lives inside Serenova. There could easily be a few hundred with his Affinity inside Castilla, tens of thousands being documented as living within that particular human kingdom through its history. While the high reaches of Spells weren’t too clear, anything below Tier 5 should’ve been well-studied regardless.
And yet… Breathe Life, the gift the Dungeon had given him, was the first time anybody had heard of it.
If not for his previous agreement to journey outside of Kulvik, Elijah was sure the remaining Royal Mages would’ve wanted to chain him down and test out every single way to use this new Spell. Some had even suggested that he stay behind regardless of the agreement, but that had luckily been shot down by Alin. His secrets were meant to be his own, no matter what notes they wanted to make about it.
Still, it made it hard for him. No previous documentation regarding the Spell made it dangerous.
A breath of Life… can’t be worse than whatever Jack is making.
That man’s recent interest in explosives made Elijah feel better about his chances. With a new strength in his heart, he searched through his prepared goods before finding a bag with relatively harmless seeds.
While not outright useful for herbal medicine, he’d brought along a few modified Blue Star seeds. The original variant could grow quite tall, being nearly a meter tall and wide, but Elijah had spent some years making them much smaller, allowing for their perfect blue flower petals to shine.
Little to no magical effects, no poisons or dangerous traits to its structure, and small enough that any explosive manifestations wouldn’t be too destructive.
Let’s see how this ends.
Taking a deep breath, Elijah called to his Core. It responded instantly, the world letting him know what he had started.
Channeling of [Breathe Life] has been activated! Current cost: 12MP/sec
Not as expensive as Elijah had feared, though there was still a—
Elijah had to take in another sharp breath of air the moment he looked away from the blue screen. The world was alive.
‘Oh, you can see like me now!’ Dawn exclaimed, looking through his eyes when she felt him stiffen. Maybe the horror running through his mind helped as well, as his view of the world expanded. ‘It’s not wrong anymore.’
… He’d seen this before.
Though it took effort, he calmed himself around that fact.
Elijah had seen the world from this perspective before, back when he’d tried to make Dawn show him the fact of the thief that had gone through their home. Back then, he’d thought the random colors outside of the normal spectrum to be an effect of different people perceiving the same colors differently, but… that wasn’t true at all.
Or it was. Somewhat. Things had been switched up back then, but that didn’t mean all of it was wrong.
Here, Elijah could see the normal colors. The wood was still brown, the grass was still green, and the sky still had the stark blue lining, but… there was more to them than that. They had a nuance, the addition of another color mixed in that Elijah had no name for. The strength was different depending on how close he was to the objects in question, the wood of the wagon having clear differences while the sky was much more subtle, but there was no question about it regardless.
Or was it about organic materials versus non-organic? The metal of his dagger carried as much nuance as the sky, but his skin—
He felt the increased drain on his Core as his eyes continued to stare at the pink flesh. It wasn’t as simple as the swirling colorings of the wood but instead something much deeper. Elijah had always known that the human body wasn’t just one organism, that there were millions, if not billions, of life forms just living inside him, but to actually see it with his very own eyes made him feel… he wasn’t sure what he was meant to be feeling.
It was as if he’d never opened his eyes until this very moment.
An understanding that had never been possible until now, an essential insight that Elijah had been missing. It was so obvious now yet he knew he would’ve never guessed it, with how far away it was from every other lesson taught by the old books. This was something human words could never hope to describe.
The pain that started to blossom in his skull, however? That was very much describable, Elijah feeling like somebody had slammed a warhammer through his head.
Instinct stopped the channeling of the Spell, his vision returned to normal, and that feeling of enlightenment faded some minutes later as well. While he still retained the information and the nuances of colors, the fundamental comprehension of what it truly meant was gone.
Curious.
Further repeats of the Spell in more controlled situations showed that it allowed his mind to skip past the normal boundaries of comprehension, moving his perspective further away from that of a human and closer to that of a plant. Or, no, plants didn’t see what he could see. What the new Spell allowed him to see was closer to that of what the Dungeon saw.
No wonder this wasn’t in the library.
Hours passed and Elijah did start to understand the mechanics a bit more. The initial low cost of channeling the Spell had been rather deceptive. The costs at that moment had been very low, yes, but that had been due to Elijah not focusing on anything organic at that time. The very second he moved away from the empty air and over to processed wood or his own flesh, the Mana required skyrocketed.
At its very peak, Elijah had a hard time sustaining the Breathe Life structure for more than twenty seconds at a time. When forcing himself not to try looking too deeply into the organic material, and the secrets hidden within, he could push it up to around a minute.
Even then, though, spending over 1000MP in such a short time was a very tiring experience. Each time Elijah did it, he needed nearly half an hour of rest to recuperate. His Core might’ve refilled, but the strain on his Mana Veins was obvious in the short bursts of pain that shot through them every now and then.
Patience was very important here.
‘Can I eat these?’ Dawn asked when the sky began to darken, using her beak to push around the seeds that Elijah had brought out hours before. ‘You’re not using them.’
He’d almost forgotten about them.
‘I’ll take one of them,’ Elijah replied, picking up the one which had sat on top. Dawn slobbered up the rest before he could blink, before settling down again in wait for the next snack to pass her by. “How far along are we?”
“With this pace, we should be less than an hour away from our first stop,” Aleksi supplied, taking a quick look at the map. They’d passed the first two splits, meaning the third and final one for the day was getting close. Soon, they’d have to make camp. “If you’re hoping to go into another one of your trances, maybe wait until we’re settled in for the night.”
Elijah ignored the cheek as he got back into position, letting his heartbeat slow down as he slowly called upon his Core. Unlike the first few times, he didn’t allow it to go at full speed at first, instead slowly acclimating his veins to the pressure they would need to endure for a little while longer.
Channeling of [Breathe Life] has been activated! Current cost: 3MP/sec
He watched the cost steadily increase until it sat around 8MP. Barely a drop in the bucket compared to the costs when he analyzed anything too complex, but this was still just a seed. While it contained the information needed to grow a beautiful flower, it was still compressed.
Not for long, however. Grow, little.
Dual-Channeling of [Breathe Life] and [Plant Bond] has been activated! Current cost: 9MP/sec
Elijah had expected the cumulative cost to be much higher, and yet it seemed that the narrowing of his focus actually decreased the energy requirements. The difference between a specialized perspective rather than a wide-reaching one, he supposed.
‘Food.’
Oh? While still barely breaking the shell of the seed, Elijah could already start to hear the whispers of the flower. Those small roots tried and failed to find purchase in dirt that wasn’t there, a small strand of green did its best to catch the warmth of the sun, and the mind hidden within sought answers that Elijah happily supplied. He gave the nutrients to the roots, allowed the stalk to prosper without the sunlight it normally needed so heavily, and the mind… it kept talking without end.
‘Food is good. More food, please,’ the green stalk requested. It didn’t order Elijah, didn’t try to force it out of him. How nice of it. ‘This is nice.’
An emotional response so early in its growth cycle? Elijah wanted to entertain the idea that it was due to the variant he’d grown being smarter than all others before it, but he could feel it was more like due to the Breathe Life spell. Though he didn’t mean to at the start, he could feel his eyes wandering around as the plant grew in his hand. The small imperfections in its structure, the random weaknesses that would impair it later on in its growth, were fixed by his hand before he knew it. All those small cracks, those lines of malformations, were gone in the blink of an eye.
And because of that, the plant would grow from a small seed into a sizable flower in the span of a single minute, Elijah able to see the hints of blue petals being prepared for blooming by the time he had to cut the channeling short.
“You know, I like my guns and everything, but seeing you work really is fascinating,” Jack commented. Elijah turned away from the flower in his hand to see the two young adults staring at him. Even Sasha had stopped her idle manipulations with the heat of the air, instead just letting a small flame burn bright from one of her fingertips. “It’s certainly more impressive than the one you did back when we just got here. This one is massive compared to the rose.”
“I suppose so,” Elijah replied, inspecting his work. With the Breathe Life Spell deactivated, he wasn’t entirely sure of the reasoning behind most of his modifications, but it was still obvious that each of them had been the right choice. The flower was still well on its way to absorbing the last bits of energy he’d granted it, using the Mana to enhance the flower petals on top and letting it bloom beautifully.
He couldn’t have gotten it to be a more perfect blue.
‘... Can I eat it?’ Dawn asked. ‘Looks tasty.’
Elijah sighed, just knowing something like this would happen.
‘No,’ he replied, fishing out something from the boxes in the back of the wagon that could work as a pot for the flower. ‘Not yet.’
Even if he didn’t have the energy to experiment further at the moment, that didn’t mean the blue flower had met the end of its usefulness just yet. If a minute of trying to grow it without malformations had resulted in something like this, what would happen once he tried to modify the flower into something else entirely?