Blue, blurry, microscopic things were flashing across the surface of the crystal, leaving transdimensional void trails that folded into themselves behind them.

I recognized them right away–my blood was doing the same thing!

“Was this thing made with blood magic?” I turned to Cali.

"Yes! Blood magic is the most effective way to p-produce and maintain a familial artifact!" Cali squeaked out, her eyes fixed on the damaged necklace. "It's been passed down through generations of Felix Arcanicx, each wielder adding their own essence to strengthen it."

I frowned, considering this new information.

Were the soul shards of Cali's ancestors sealed in this thing? Is that why the damn thing was moving on its own, doing magic even when it was cut off from the girl? If so, then the blood magic within the lavalier was also potentially manipulating its wielder. I recalled the Yaga’s words about the dangers of blood magic and how void-born things could manipulate the witch who used it, get into someone's head.

I looked at Cali. Her entire body was trembling now as she tried to reach out to the lavalier with her blue, pulsing Aura, looking like an addict that was missing her fix.

“Doesn’t blood magic attract all sorts of nightmarish entities from beyond the grave or whatever?” I asked. “Right. You can move if you feel like it, but don’t try to grab the necklace. I’m getting tired of you trembling and squealing.”

“It… it does,” Cali slid to the floor hugging herself and sniffing. “But that’s what the protective runes on it are for!”

“I see,” I said.

The merchant girl looked at me from the floor, wiping her face with a sleeve.

“What was your plan for me exactly?” I asked her. “Be extra-super honest this time.”

“I was going to keep you as my first Champion,” she said, lowering her eyes. “I’d uplift, educate you as much as I could, teach you to read and write, pull you from your barbarous ignorance of the Nordstaii… and in turn, I’d want you to protect me, be my shield and sword… so that I can go further across the known world… searching for Star-Shards.”

“How much mental manipulation would this involve?” I arched an eyebrow.

“As little as possible... with gradual, increased exposure to my Aura,” Cali said. “I’d make you happy as my first, I swear! Thralls who are pushed too hard into doing what they don’t want to… can snap mentally, become mentally damaged, less responsive, dull. I don’t want a brain-dead Champion at my side! You were supposed to be my prized gem that I would polish, slowly grind down into a perfect, indestructible diamond!”

The lavalier wiggled on the floor again so I hammered it even harder, making it still.

“How are you doing this?” She asked.

“Doing what?” I asked as Stormy climbed up my shoulder to wrap around my neck.

“Magic,” she said. “Are you really a boy?”

“I am,” I nodded. “What, are there seriously no male Sorcerers across all of Thornwild?”

“None that I know about,” Cali exhaled. “Sorcery, or the ‘outer projection’, or ‘the radiance of wisdom’ is the domain of the feminine. Internal fortitude or ‘the funnel of endless hunger’ is the domain of the masculine."

"Why?" I asked, processing the odd titles.

"It's... it's just how the world works," Cali said. "Since Starfall, the balance of power has been clear. Men cultivate internal fortitude, drawing magical power into themselves, harden their blood to become Champion knights, heroes and warriors. Women, on the other hand, project their souls outwards, manipulating the energies of the world around them with Star-Shards, turning into Sorceresses.

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“The greater Champion a Sorceress has at her side, the slower she will age and the longer she will… survive. Sorceresses are dangerously clever, but also easily broken compared to the practically invincible Champions. Unlike the men, we cannot fly! Star-Shards simply can’t lift something off the ground for that long. I… I was g-going to train you well, pay for a good Champion instructor in Iridium, feed you many stardust-infused leviathan-beast steaks, s-so you could learn how to fly so that I could… see the view above the clouds some day!” She sniffed.

“This... division between flying men and magic-wielding women existed since Starfall?” I asked, ignoring her aspiration to be Lois Lane from Superman.

“From what they taught us at the Iridium Istria Maggelanum–Cometfall changed everything. When the Wormwood Star struck our world, it didn't just reshape the land. It reshaped us."

She took a deep breath, trying to relax. "Legend has it that when the comet fell from the sky a multitude of its shards scattered across all of Thornwild. The bravest men, seeing the destruction and creation wrought by these celestial fragments, followed the falling stars and… chose to swallow them whole."

"They… what?" I sputtered.

"They swallowed the star-fragments they found, internalizing their power,” Cali said. “It burned them from within, reforging their bodies into vessels of incredible strength, endurance and power. These men became the first Champions, the progenitors of the cultivator-warrior clans which later fell to the rising power of the Maggelanums. These Clans of Immortal men were incredibly strong, yes, but they didn’t have power to influence minds which we, Felix Arcanicx, learned to wield over centuries.”

"I see. So the women were wise enough not to eat random sky detritus?" I prompted.

"The women," Cali continued, sending me a glare, "approached the star shards they found differently. Where men consumed, women communed. They held the shards in their hands, letting the cosmic energy flow through them and out into the world. It changed them too, from the outside,” Cali gestured at her cat ears and tail. “Granting them the ability to manipulate the very fabric of reality. They became the founder Sorceresses, laid the foundation of Iridium Istria Maggelanum and other great Maggelanums circling the great Castian Sea.”

“But that was a while ago, no?” I asked. “What about now?”

"Now Sorceresses train their daughters to wield the shards passed from generation to generation,” Cali said. “Women become Artificers, Seers, Searchers, or Dealermancers like myself.”

"But surely," I pressed, "there must be exceptions? Men who can do magic, women who become warriors?"

Cali shook her head. “Not in living memory. Not since Archmage Korranta tried to make her twin sons… into Sorcerers.”

I waited for her to elaborate.

"She fed her boys deadly nightshade flowers to unlock their inner eye, and gave them their own star shards. Her children bathed their shards in their blood upon their 13th birthday, laying claim to the magical amplifiers. At first, her experiment seemed to have worked. The boys showed signs of magical ability - small tricks, flashes of insight, even the ability to manipulate minor elemental forces. Korranta was elated, convinced she was on the brink of revolutionizing everyone’s understanding of magic."

"But then..." Cali shuddered. "Then everything went horribly wrong.”

Cali took a deep breath, her eyes distant. "The powers of her twins grew rapidly, far beyond what Korranta had anticipated. And with that growth came… instability.

"The boys began to change. Their bodies gradually warped, distorted, shifted in impossible ways."

Cali's voice dropped an octave. "Korranta refused to listen to other Archmagi because she loved her children so much. She didn’t want to accept that her sons were changing into abominations that were neither human nor beast. Eventually their bodies inverted completely, flesh and organs moving to their outside. Whatever used to make them human, their very souls… folded inward, lost to the void. In turn, the void took control of their bodies. They became what your people call… Jotuns.”

She shuddered. "The twins did terrible things when they escaped Korranta’s tower… Several villages were wiped off the map. It took a coalition of the most powerful Sorceresses and their Champions to finally stop them."

"And Korranta?" I asked.

Cali's eyes met mine. "She couldn't bear what she'd done. In the end, she used her own magic to... to unmake herself. It's said that in her final moments, she cursed all those who would seek to upset the natural order of magic."

She sighed heavily. "Since then, no one has dared to attempt what Korranta did. The disaster serves as a cautionary tale, a reminder of why men and women must stick to their respective magical domains. It's not just tradition–it's a safeguard against catastrophe. The Arch-Sorceresses of the Magellanums figured out that any woman who tried to eat a Star-Shard to reinforce her strength, would share the same fate–gradually going mad and turning inside out.”

“I see,” I pursed my lips.

“If you’re truly a male Sorcerer,” Cali said. “Then whoever created you made a grave mistake. As long as you continue to influence the world outside your body with your Aura, then eventually… in time you’ll simply turn inside out, go insane, lose whatever it is that makes you human.”