The connection trembles, as if the earth is evaluating my request, ruminating over it and considering it. And then…I feel it soften beneath my finger tips.

Barely able to believe it, I press with my fingers, feeling them sink in. The sensation is familiar from my pottery sessions – clay indeed.

Triumph runs through me, a laugh emerging from my lips. A moment later, I feel the earth magic twitch where I’m connected to it through the oblong of earth-nature mana still dangling between my Energy channel and the greater body of earth magic. It doesn’t like the abrupt change in my emotions, I realise, so I do my best to push the excitement away, returning to calm placidity. As much as I can, anyway – pleasure bubbles under the surface despite my best efforts.

So, I’ve been able to change the nature of the earth with my magic. That’s a good start. Great, even. But I wonder whether I can push it a bit further. I think that softening stone into a clay-like consistency is enough to count for at least some earth-related Skill. Certainly, I feel the sensation of a notification waiting for me and I’m pretty sure that my internal matrix has been rearranging itself a little, though can’t be sure about that until I go to check it out. But I don’t know if it’s enough for Earth-Shaping exactly. After all, arguably I’m still shaping the earth with my hand rather than the magic itself.

With a very clear image in mind, I coax the earth into moving, into forming a bowl-shape beneath my hand. Without putting any pressure on the soft stone with my fingers, I press on it with my mind.

It resists, though I don’t get the impression that its resistance is a rejection. It’s more, that its default is to resist anything – wind, water, fire, force, light, anything. I don’t give up – earth is patient and persistent, using time and the accumulation of pressure to make changes.

Slowly, the resistance crumbles, like stone developing cracks in a frost. It takes time but finally, just like that stone falling apart once the cracks grow too large for it to remain whole, the resistance gives way. I feel the earth move below my hand, turning my vision into reality.

This time, my exhilaration is too great for me to push it away. The sudden wash of emotion sends the earth recoiling, abruptly sensing me as ‘other’ in the same way the fire did when I refused to let it burn my clothes, all that time ago. The sausage of clay-like earth mana falls from my energy channels and blends into the rest of the earth magic. Its absence leaves that hand feeling oddly lighter.

I open my eyes and look at what I’ve done. A shallow bowl made of stone is in front of me. It’s a perfectly smooth shape, very obviously not natural. Just like the caves Kalanthia made, actually. When I close my eyes again and focus on seeing the energy threads, I see that the bowl looks no different from any of the areas around it – the magic is reinforcing it as much as it reinforces the rest of the tunnel. A good sign.

I take a moment to bask in my satisfaction. Then, anticipation building, I access my notifications.

Congratulations!

You have earned a new Skill: Earth-Shaping

Read Skill description / Close message

Yes! I exclaim to myself in elation. Finally!

Earth-Shaping

By exploring and coming to an understanding of earth, you have become able to transform mana into earth magic, and have proved yourself capable of controlling and shaping this magic according to your Will. Henceforth, you will now be more easily able to connect with the earth around you at a thought and shape it. However, as you have learned, earth takes time and requires a connection with its wielder, both through mana and trust. Your Fire Affinity is opposed to most aspects of Earth and will therefore make this more difficult in its initial stages.

Next message / Close messages

While the message is rather reminiscent of the one I received for Fire-Shaping, there are some significant differences. It seems like Willpower is less important with earth than fire, though I would be hesitant to agree. From the experiences I’ve had, I’d say that they are just different. Fire certainly needs firm control to stop it getting out of hand. Earth doesn’t need control, from what I can see; it needs determination. But what is determination but just another form of willpower?

I remember the message before talking about being able to ‘summon fire at a thought’. This one talks about being able to ‘connect with the earth’ instead, highlighting a major difference here. I suspect that I won’t be able to just create a rock in my hand, though I might be able to form one out of the earth beneath my feet. Or perhaps that’s somewhere I could take the Skill in later rank-ups, even if I can’t do it right now.

The message also really highlights how important connection is, though it’s thrown in something that I hadn’t thought of before: trust. Fire also required a certain degree of trust, but that was for Fire-Taming, not Fire-Shaping – if I had kept my agreement with the previous iteration of fire, it would make a new agreement easier to make. Equally, the reverse was true too.

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Is there something similar with earth? That the more I work with it, the easier I’ll find to connect to it? Perhaps – certainly Kalanthia didn’t seem to have to concentrate even a fraction as much as I’ve had to just for this one small bowl. However, I am conscious of the last line of the message: that I’m going to have a more difficult job due to my Fire Affinity.

Not unexpected, I suppose. Dumping earth on top is usually a pretty good means of putting out fire. And fire transforms earth, like turning sand to glass or melting metal and reforming it. Though maybe that’s what it’s referring to when it mentions ‘most aspects’ rather than ‘all aspects’. Perhaps these areas of crossover are where I’ll have more ease.

If so, that might be good news for my upcoming attempts to make metal weapons and tools – if I can melt metal without needing to construct a furnace, that would definitely speed things up a bit. Though I guess I’ll need to do it the hard way too for the samurans to know how to do it without me.

The sound of a large form moving through the tunnel above meets my ears and recalls me to the present pressures. There’s time enough to think about all that later. Right now, I have a feeling that I’m out of time.

He’s coming, Bastet warns, then jumps down to join me in the tunnel below.

The sun is touching the horizon on the third day of our truce, the alcaoris tells me tersely. Seeing as how it’s such a temporary Bond, I’ve stopped myself from naming him. Do you have an alternative solution?

“I do,” I tell him, relief running through me that, somehow, I managed to make the breakthrough just in time.

Explain.

“It’s the same solution as I’ve spoken to you about before: forming a large bowl in the middle of the tunnel where Pure Energy can collect and surround your eggs. Then the overflow will continue on its way through the tunnel, no pressure building up. A win, win.”

Then where is this bowl? the alcaoris asks doubtfully, sticking his large head down into the hole and looking around. The one near you there is far too small for my eggs.

I have a sudden thought that, if I could get the earth to react quickly enough, I could slice his head off here and now. I doubt even a Tier three could survive that.

But I dismiss the thought almost as quickly as it comes. Not only is it unfeasible since I can’t move the earth that quickly, but it’s not something I’d really want to do. Not while I have an alliance and the alcaoris isn’t threatening anything I care about. Not when there are other options.

Though I am curious about how much Energy would come from a Tier three’s death. Well, perhaps I’ll find out one day. For now, the dragon-like father just asked a question.

“I need you to tell me how big the bowl needs to be and then I’ll make it,” I tell him honestly. I was planning on guesstimating based on the shape of the eggs that I can see from this side of things, but if the alcaoris is down here to ask, I might as well get him to tell me.

A single egg would need a hole at least four times that depth, the alcaoris says critically. Its width would suffice for a single egg, but not for three of them. And there must be plenty of Pure Energy all the way around each of the eggs.

I nod thoughtfully, the description helping me to construct an image of what I should make. I also need to make sure that it’s not an issue if the stream changes position in the middle of the tunnel for some reason. At the moment, there’s a small channel which indicates the path it normally comes, but who knows what might change when we release the Pure Energy?

With an image in mind, I settle back down to the floor, my hand outstretched to lie flat on the surface. This time, I use my left hand. I tend to use my right hand for fire magic since I’m right-hand dominant. Perhaps the channels there are more used to fire magic. It will be interesting to see if it makes a difference.

“This may take a few minutes,” I warn the alcaoris. “Please don’t disturb me until it’s done unless it’s an emergency.”

As long as it doesn’t take too long, warns the alcaoris in return. My patience is not infinite.

Mentally, I roll my eyes – what’s his hurry? I don’t say anything, though – the quicker this is done, the better.

Focussing on my image, I patiently repeat the process I followed before to make the first bowl. Immediately, the influence of actually having Earth-Shaping is clear. My mana transforms more easily into earth-aspected mana and the connection with the earth is a little easier. After that, though, coaxing the earth to do what I want it to do takes as much effort and almost as much time as before. Understandably, Earth-Shaping has more effect on my internal processes than the external ones.

Still, bit by bit, I make progress, my vision taking shape before my fingers. I think it is a little easier with my left hand, though I will have to test again with my right hand to check that it’s not just the influence of my new Skill.

It takes a lot of mana. Mana to make the connection, and mana to feed into the earth to make the changes. By the end, I’m panting and nauseous from mana depletion and I haven’t even quite done everything I wanted.

Still, it’s probably enough. I open my eyes to see what I’ve managed to create. Mentally summoning Aingeal to get a better view, the little ball of fire happily zooms closer.

I’ve made a big hole in the middle of the tunnel. If I stepped into it, it would come up to just above my knee. It’s about twice that in diameter, though it’s not a perfect hemisphere. Instead, I’ve made the downstream wall much steeper than the upstream one, hoping that it will prevent the eggs from being pushed out accidentally.

On either side of the hole, I’ve stretched two v-shape arms stretching back upstream – channels, really. My thoughts are that if the stream doesn’t go straight into the hole for whatever reason, hopefully it will be caught by the arms and then directed into the hole anyway. We’ll find out soon enough if it works or not.

“What do you think?” I ask the father alcaoris. He tilts his head this way and that, looking with both eyes and then each one independently.

It looks big enough, he answers finally, though sounds a bit dubious. Perhaps he wonders, like me, whether it will work as intended.

“Alright, good. Let’s release the flow and test it out, then.”