Day 26
Meditation attempt 42 - no changes, no improvement, still can't sense nor see spirits when I close my eyes.
I opened my eyes and watched as Stormy sat atop a large barrel and nibbled on the brilliantly glowing, violet-shimmering grass birthed from the body of one of the bandits.
Judging by the unnaturally vibrant way the grass glowed and how it grew overnight, my hypothesis had been correct. The witch’s garden fed on people. This is probably how witches turned evil - it was far too easy to gain power by feeding my glade people.
The concept of an evil witch was simple: make some heroes, get them to bring dead bodies in droves and you’re in business.
I momentarily wondered if I was going to turn into a nerdy florist protagonist from the Little Shop of Horrors who got tricked into feeding people to an alien plant monster. Remembering the 1986 American horror comedy musical film made me smile.
“You know, if I can feed people to the garden and get this much power back,” I mused to Stormy. “Then it stands to reason that anything big and organic can be fed to the garden to increase its potency. I think the next elk we hunt is going to go into a barrel in its entirety… too bad I skinned the last one in the forest as it was too big to lug home.”
“Mrmrm,” Stormy replied, settling atop of the barrel and staring down at me.
I stood up and placed my palm on the earth that filled the barrel. It felt warm to my touch. The 3 cubic feet of soil covering up the body of the bald raider practically shined with life-rad energy like a space heater.
“I’m going to need a way bigger barrel,” I said. “No way an entire elk would fit into one of these, even if I chop it up.”
“Mrayaw,” Stormy said, pawing at the grass playfully.
“You’re right, I don’t understand the conversion metric or the process itself yet.” I nodded, rubbing my chin. “I know that the domain soil absorbs spiritual energy from living things and somehow converts it into magical power...”
I grabbed the Codex and outlined my thoughts.
Domain power conversion process:
Organic life > Extracted spiritual essence > Crystalline microstructures
Results in:
[1] Rapid microbial proliferation
[2] Rapid vegetative propagation
[3] Material Augmentation:
1. [strain hardening]
2. [higher saponification]
3. [increased nutrition, food & liquid fortification]
[4] Personal Benefits: improved stamina, strength & faster response time
[5] Improved familiar intelligence [?]
“You’re more intelligent, right? If you can understand what I’m saying, lift your left paw," I eyed the kitten.
Stormy nodded, wiggling her left paw in the air.
“Thought so,” I smiled and gave the kitten a pet.
I began to pace around the barrel, crystal chainmail twinkling atop my body, my mind going over everything I had learned over the brief duration of my new life in Svalbard.
“If my theory is correct, then the life-rad contained within these crystals is able to grant me personal power, augmenting my stamina and response time.” I paused in front of my captivated audience of a single, wide-eyed kitten and tapped the crystal strands hanging all over my body.
“The question is–what is the trigger mechanism for its activation?”
Stormy hung on my every word, keen on delving into the vast mysteries at the heart of my exposition or perhaps she was simply attracted by the spiritual light sparkling on the violet gemstones.
“Twice now, I experienced what I would call bullet-time. The first time happened when the elk almost mowed me down and the second in the moment when the bandits discussed my enslavement,” I said. “Several times this morning, I attempted to purposefully slow down time... It didn’t work. Just like my numerous failed attempts at meditation over the past two weeks, I seem to be missing some vital activation trigger."
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I tapped my chin.
“Perhaps the flight or fight response somehow pulls life-rad from the crystals,” I said.
The kitten tilted her head at me.
“The fight or flight reaction, also known as the stress response, happens when hormones are released that either make us want to stay and face an enemy or run away from it,” I clarified. “During the fight or flight response, rapid changes occur in our bodies to prepare us for facing danger. When we feel threatened, our brains release chemicals like adrenaline, which increases our heart rate and breathing, and cortisol, which raises our blood sugar levels.”
I eyed Stormy. She looked bored. It was probably too many big words for her kitten brain to process. I resumed my pacing around the barrel.
“If a witch’s domain is a spiritual extension of her or in my case, his body,” I pondered. “Then the blurry shapes crawling or dancing atop of these crystals are perhaps spiritual extensions of me, or… better yet, spirits aligned to me. If everything living here on Thornwild possesses a quantum imprint, an energy matrix of some sort, then the witch’s garden acts as a conversion… or perhaps a realignment agent for the spiritual essence that inhabits all organic life.”
The kitten yawned.
I grabbed my Astralscope and peered through it out the window at the ice-covered river.
Silver-blue radiance danced atop of the river, like a strange, enchanting aurora. I aimed the Astralscope at the barrel. Distinctively violet aurora-like, blurry, semi-distinctive shapes moved from one leaf to another.
“River Glinka is a potent spirit not aligned to me,” I concluded. “Spirits born in my garden on the other hand are aligned to my own… auric signature? Yeah, let’s go with that term.”
Stormy resumed chewing on the purple grass.
“Trading with Glinka is dangerous because she has her own desires, while the spirits residing in my domain don’t require any kind of a trade. Presumably, some of them give up their energy willingly to me when I am threatened. If I had to hazard a guess, the violet-tinted crystal matrices are in some way able to create astral projections, which manifest as these ethereal entities.” I pointed my finger at the biggest spirit that was slowly crawling up a plant stem. “If the Astral Ocean contains the memories of everything that ever lived, then these astral projections are simply borrowing the shapes of long dead creatures that fossilized into the rock long ago. That would explain why the spirits residing in my garden take on these random shapes.”
Stormy lazily pawed at the fat, blurry, crab-like spirit with a star-shaped shell that I was pointing at.
“Whatever these auric constructs are… they’re mindless imprints that are replicating the motions of some primordial critter.” I pushed the plant away and the crab-spirit simply remained floating in the air. “See? It’s just floating there. It has no idea what it’s doing and shows no response to my stimuli.”
The kitten leapt at the floating crab, slashing through it. She tumbled through the air and nearly rolled off the barrel. I smiled, amused by Stormy’s playful antics.
“Presumably, if I am able to hunt down and kill a magical beast, my garden will be able to convert it into much more distinctive, more powerful spirits,” I mulled. “If common rocks are able to crystallize to house a spiritual matrix, then maybe it would be more effective if I procure a large crystal and insert that into the barrel as it converts life to energy? Maybe a bigger crystal will have an easier time listening to me? I can’t keep relying on a fight-or-flight response as the only means of pulling energy from my crystal matrices.”
“Mrrm-mrm,” Stormy tilted her head curiously.
“Minerals have highly ordered and repetitive atomic arrangements. X-ray diffraction and polarizing microscopy helped mineralogists and chemists investigate their nature. Breaking a single crystal into chunks, for instance, still retains its internal atomic pattern,” I went into narration mode. “But why does syntropy, aka a repetitive atomic pattern, produce magic?”
Stormy’s eyes glazed over. She clearly had no idea who mineralogists were.
“I think that the witch’s domain or any kind of a magical domain… produces some kind of a stable field,” I stipulated. “A type of a persistent energy-wave, which somehow overwrites and amplifies existing crystalline patterns within various minerals and materials. The best reference I can think of... is a phonograph, a recording mechanism invented by Thomas Edison in 1877, which recorded sound on a cylinder coated with wax or tinfoil. My domain, located in the interior of this pub, is a three metre diameter sphere populated by plants and powered by the dead souls… acts as a large Astralgraph. Yeah, that’s a great word for it, don’t you think?”
“Mrmr,” Stormy rolled her eyes. The kitten probably didn’t care why or how things worked.
“My theory is that a sleeping witch acts akin to a recording pin which embeds astral imprints into nearby crystals!” I declared, adding another line to my Codex chart.
[6] The witch and her domain form The Astralgraph > The Astralgraph projects a field The Auric Signature > field creates a crystalline matrix via Syntropic Crystallization > Syntropic Gems manifests an Astral Projection aka Auric Construct > Auric Construct performs a specific job.
“It would also be an interesting experiment to find a fairy circle or a cursed domain and procure crystals from it to see if my garden can use them in some manner,” I pondered. “I have no idea if it will be easier or harder to overwrite crystalline structures that already have a set imprint in them.”
The kitten looked in the direction of the river.
“That is an option,” I nodded. “I could grab a few pebbles from Glinka. No doubt, they will have Glinka's Auric Signature embedded in them for me to analyze. If I’m right, then they should be aligned to the river. Magic is theoretically everywhere, I just need to start using my Astralscope to look for spots in the forest that are packed full of life-rad or perhaps death-rad if the place is cursed...”
“Meow!” the kitten shook her head, clearly not eager to visit highly questionable, cursed locations.
“I know,” I responded. “It might be dangerous, but science often involves taking some risks. Marie Curie didn’t win Nobel Prizes in Chemistry and Physics by playing it safe.”
“Brrrr?” Stormy demanded.
“Marie died at the age of 66 due to aplastic anemia, which was caused by her long-term exposure to radiation…” I pursed my lips. “Radiation is nasty business. Okay... fine. I won’t try to handle death-rad crystals with my bare hands. You got a point there, I’ll use tongs!”