“You learned how to enhance the minor spells on your own. Tell me: what do you know of the amplification order?”
Sorrinn and Lua had returned outside, to the front yard. The day was still young, so there was time to sneak in a lesson.
“Uhmm…” The boy erected fingers as he listed the amplifiers off: “Energy… Density… Volume… Annnnd acceleration?”
“Correct—almost. Your knowledge is incomplete. Allow me to fill the voids.” She unveiled her hand from within her sleeve and performed the hand-trembling gesture of Stone Shard. A beautiful, smooth, ridged, horn-like spike materialized from the coalescing dust within the second. She nudged her hand forward and the shard fired with an intensity that would’ve knocked a grown man off his feet. The force visibly rippled the air like water. All of that force almost seemed to curve around her, however. Yet, when the shard struck the target, it wasn’t moving fast enough to even pierce into the stone. It bounced off the target’s face before pathetically thumping against the grass, left still.
Her hand resubmerged into her sleeve. “Conditions. Each of the amplification variables may be further personalized with the instillment of conditions into the spell at an additional wealth toll. There, I instilled two conditions onto the spell. One: The opposing force produced by its propulsion will not bear against me. Two: The rate of acceleration will decline at a specified rate over two seconds until either arriving at a neutral state or being obstructed.
“The primary phase of mastery: casting a spell in its baremost, untampered form. The secondary phase of mastery: ascending a spell beyond its base with auxiliary amplifications. The tertiary phase of mastery: making a spell one’s own through the swift and apt application of conditions. Last comes true mastery: becoming able to apply a variation of amplifications and conditions onto a single spell to fit a variety of situations and needs on command.
“To frame it into perspective, the common imbibitor does not know the wealth capacity to reach the tertiary phase of mastery even if they host the mind for it. At most, they will be able to climb a quarter or halfway through the secondary phase with any given spell before hitting the wall of incohesion. For most, to rise to those reaches is something undestined.”
That was a game-changer. His mind already raced imagining all of the possibilities. Having Aqua Shot freeze on impact. Making Stone Shard rotate like a drill and double in forward acceleration once arriving at the midway point to its designated target. Using that force condition to not be launched every time he used Wind Burst. Even setting a condition on Firebolt that would theoretically allow it to burn forever by slowly increasing its energy factor indefinitely. There was so much he wanted to experiment with. He was already frothing at the mouth as he pranced on his toes and squeaked, doing a little arm dance.
He was also shocked by the drop of perspective she afforded him about his potential. Assuming his ancestry was the cause for his being an outlier, being a descendant of the physical half of The Mystic Force was showing its upsides. There were probably other outlier races as well, such as the Eldradimon, who bore close ties to the Great Forests, which he believed had origins sourcing to The Mystic Force as well. Not being a full-blooded Human was great.
“Your next task shall be to achieve true mastery with the four spells you’ve learned. Take as much time as you require. Now I shall leave you to your practice.” Lua circled and returned to her home without further word in typical Lua fashion.
Overeager, Sorrin materialized a howling storm of wind around his wand, amped its density up, and unleashed it forth. The next thing he knew, he was sprawled over the grass, winded and choking for a breath. He swore he’d input the condition, but he supposed he hadn’t. He crawled to his knees with tears burning his eyes, hopping back to it. No pain, no gain.
He was at it for the rest of his time at Lua’s house. In following attempts, he learned the window for instilling conditions was always at the tip of the order of operations. One had to know precisely what conditions were being applied and had until the spell activated to instill them. His experiments bridged across an array of conditions—simple versus multilayered. Simple conditions such as making the opposite force of Wind Burst route around himself were inexpensive, he found. No matter how much density and speed he packed into the spell, the toll of the condition didn’t increase either. It was a one-time purchase. Of course, his goal wasn’t to blow Lua’s house away, so he exercised some restraint in not dumping all of his wealth into the spell just for the sake of seeing how powerful the spell could become.
Something like making the projectile speed increase over time, however, could continuously draw from his wealth if he so pleased. He could either set a max acceleration upfront, at which the necessary amount of wealth would be drawn immediately, or he could leave the max acceleration unspecified, at which his wealth would continue to drain until the projectile broke apart, was forced into a neutral state by a greater opposing force, or his wealth ran dry. Considering he had many more experiments to run, he didn’t let too much of it drain before cutting the wire.
And he tried everything and more: Making a superdense Aqua Shot not immediately explode after being fired, but explode upon impact with a target. Making Wind Burst compress as it traveled to reduce the dispersion effect and increase its effective range. Gradually increasing Firebolt’s flame puddle volume overtime, once while increasing its energy and once without increasing its energy.
In the case of stacking multiple conditions on top of one another, he learned every condition succeeding the first exponentially multiplied in wealth cost. If the second condition was a pond’s worth, the third was a small lake’s worth. Nor did it matter how minor the extra conditions were. They always bit a chunk out of his mystic wealth by default, growing more costly the more complex the additional conditions were.
He tested making Stone Shard superheat, drill spin at immense speeds, and propel forward with a doubling burst of momentum upon the condition of coming into contact with an opposing force. The one spell alone made him become lightheaded, so much of his wealth was drained at once.
The spell was… effective, to say the least. With a firm thrust of his wand, he launched it at the target at a moderate speed. But the moment its speartip met and pierced into the stone—the defined opposing force—the shard glowed red hot in a loud exhale of heat, spun so fast, its molten exterior was smoothened into a drill shape beneath the pressure as it produced a grating, shrill hum, and obliterated the target into a rain of debris come the second burst of propulsion. He was left sprawled over the grass on his back, unable to move a limb from exhaustion; nonetheless, worth it.
The tricky part about applying conditions was how long it took him to imprint them into the spell. He’d spent all of that time working his rudimentary spells of Creation down to a second under in the secondary phase only to be pushed back up to needing five minutes to cast a single spell affirming he weaved in the conditions properly at the end of the operation in the tertiary phase. That only invigorated him, however. The idea of spending the next few months whittling seconds at a time off of the tertiary phase with those spells toward his aim of mastering them already had his chest tingling from excitement. Imagining how far he could stretch his creativity with the conditions once he got the hang of them, he truly had sprouted into heaven. He couldn’t contain the odd smile stretching across his face or the fuzzy sense of permeating warmth painting his pale cheeks a light shade of pink.
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*Bing*
[+1! Arcana has increased to 46!]
Sorrinn was right there, laying on the grass, when Orrillimmirr returned from the northern woodlands. His father found him contentedly giggling with himself after a long day of trial, error, and effort. His mystic wealth was drained unlike it’d ever been drained before in all of his time making a mystic cultivation effort. He couldn’t do much more than giggle, because training in the tertiary phase had pushed his body to all of its limits—physical, mental, and spiritual alike. He couldn’t imagine the herculean effort it was hoisting a higher-tiered spell into the tertiary phase yet alone mastering it by definition if it was that arduous for the most rudimentary of spells of Creation.
“I see you had a productive day, little one.” Orrillimmirr scooped his son up into his arms by the fold of his legs and his back. With him in tow, he began on their way home beneath the blue-pink-orange ombre sky, amidst the moist warmth of the passing breeze. “What wisdom did you sow into the soils of your mind today, if I may so inquire?”
Sorrinn could barely keep his eyes open. A soporific weight pressed heavy against his thoughts. “Conditions, Paba…” his tired voice sleepily and softly yawned. He snuggled up in his father’s arms, laying his head against his chest. His father’s robes were so soft against his cheek.
“I see. Your growth in the arts is astonishing. It would seem you really have taken after your father…” By then, Sorrinn was snoozing in the security of Orrillimmirr’s cradle. Orrillimmirr adopted a saddened smile parallel to the uncharacteristic look of perturbation festering in his eyes. “Sleep well, my child.”
***
The next morning when Sorrinn awoke, his eyes opened to the image of his father standing before his bedroom window, back to him. His all-white tunic and thin-fabric robe billowed gently in the hot summer breeze sneaking in, shepherding the scent of grass.
Sorrinn rubbed his eyes awake while wearing a questioning look. “Paba?”
Despite hearing his son’s words, Orrillimmirr hadn’t turned around. He simply continued peering into the astir village beyond, hosting a pensive silence. Soon, he circled in the company of that graceful and calm smile of his. “Morning, little one.” An old, ornate scroll was in his hand. He moved closer and outstretched it toward Sorrinn. “Once upon a time, you inquired of me if I could conjure the influences of the mystic arts as the other Elves in the village can. At the time, I denied and performed the grievous sin of offering no further information to sate your young curiosity—leaving you unilluminated. The truth is: I wasn’t being honest with you—not of ill-intent, but of fear. In a distant lifetime, in truth, I was a sublime, blessed, and gifted imbibitor much beloved by The Mystic Force—just as you are.”
His loving smile deepened like the flavor of a century-old wine as he exhaled a solemn breath. “I prayed your mother’s humanity would dilute your Asuurriian blood as it has your brother. But observing your growth, I find myself oft ushered into fond reminiscences of my childhood… Your insatiable curiosity and pursuit for knowledge; your enamoredness of the mystic arts and voracity to achieve a perfect harmony with the forces of magic… You are my son in every way. You’ve inherited the ambitions of my youth as if by blood.” That beautiful smile of his submerged beneath the waves of his trepidation. “Which is why I now fear you’ll walk a kindred path and end up scorched, having tread too close to The Sustainer’s Radiance. Your intellect far surpasses mine when I was your age. You’re capable of comprehending the truth of what it means to stand close to a Paragon whilst only being composed of mortal flesh and bone.”
Sorrinn had never seen his father make such a face—so lost of control and frightened because of it. He crawled across his bed, hesitant, and accepted the scroll. Orrillimmirr turned to face the window as Sorrin unfurled it.
The scroll was written in Elven Common. There were fistfuls of complicated words he didn’t know littered all throughout the text, but he had enough of a grasp on the language to at least fill the gaps in with spackle. The word ‘Asuurrii’ was all over the scroll. From what he was able to cobble together using context clues to define unknown words and broad guesstimations, the scroll was about a supposed ‘curse’ inflicted on Elves of Asuurriian blood. Asuurriian Elves were the bloodline whose ‘blood purity’ remained closest to that of The Ancestor’s and the Nine Luminaries’. As such, Asuurriian Elves were the Elven bloodline with the immensest innate cohesion with The Mystic Force. However, it was stated to be the ‘inevitable’ fate of all Asuurriians to be subsumed by the wild storm of arcane energy within them and be reduced to something called ‘vissaarimm’.
He looked up from the scroll. “What is ‘vissaarimm,’ Paba?”
“…It’s what happens when the storm erodes the last remaining pieces of one’s self, and all which remains is an erratic, conscienceless vessel of cataclysmic and unfettered energy—a living disaster phenomena. Asuurriians are blessed and fated to soar high in this world. Vissaarimm is the fall destined of all who foolishly dare to soar too close to The Sustainer.”
Sorrinn’s adorable features already grieved the idea of losing his father. Tears welling in his eyes, anxiety pursing in his lips, he asked softly and shrilly with a quavering voice, “Will that happen to you?”
Orrillimmirr turned, his smile ineffably reassuring. A shake of his head. “I decided long ago the highs of the pinnacle weren’t worth self-annihilating over. I sealed the storm deep inside and adopted the vows of an ascetic to never unleash it again, even at the cost of forfeiting the thing I once loved most.”
That was sad, but also a breath of relief. Sorrinn was able to wipe his tears with peace.
Did that mean the higher he pushed himself toward the attribute ceiling, the sooner he’d succumb to vissaarimm? He wasn’t so sure about that. He had a lot of innate Arcana potential, but he doubted it rivaled Orrillimmirr’s potential in his prime. His Human blood had diluted his Asuurriian blood somewhat. The key difference that soothed the alarms was that his growth was supported by The System as an Ascender. The System urged him to soar as the wind beneath his wings. And if the sun became too hot, it’d become the radiation shield that preserved his wings from becoming scorched. Maybe vissaarimm would eventually become a problem, at which the Ascendance Shop would sell him the solution to deter it. It did deal in matters of bodily evolution as well as supernatural abilities. Even then, he wasn’t so sure. Surely he wouldn’t have inherited the Luminary of Creation’s mantle if The Ancestor didn’t believe him capable of bearing the air at the throat of the world.
Discerning Sorrinn’s confusion and sadness, Orrillimmirr lowered himself to his level, holding both of his son’s hands in his own. “I’m not demanding you forfeit your passion, little one. It’s my job as your father to affirm you’re always armed with wisdom of this world that you will one day have to brave on your own. Perhaps you’ll even come to surpass me and discover the secrets of conquering our kind’s gradual erosion into volatility as I could not. Know whatever path you may walk in this world, I will always stand behind you, supporting you, cheering you on.”
Sorrinn lunged from where he sat on his bed and hugged his father. “I love you, Paba. Sorry you can’t use magic anymore.”
Orrillimmirr exhaled a mirthful sound. He kissed Sorrinn’s head. “I love you too, little one. You shall always be my joy. Fret not; I accepted my sacrifice long ago.” Once the moment passed, they separated, but his father hadn’t arisen. “I discovered troubling signs in the northern woodlands yesterday. You’ll have to keep from Lua’s home and the northern plain for the time being.”
“What’s wrong?” Sorrinn questioned.
“Through the efforts of my investigation, I discovered lesser monsters of the woodlands known as Celpi have begun to act and move strangely. It will require further investigation on my part to reveal why, but it’s safe to conclude at present more threats may descend from the forest due to their shift in behavior. I don’t want you getting caught in a monster attack. Promise me.”
Sorrinn didn’t need to be told twice to steer clear of more entities like the centurion golem. He was quite fond of his life. “Okay, I promise.” Considering Orrillimmirr was nothing more than a man in the absence of his magic, he was more worried about his father getting himself hurt—or worse. His trepidation soaked into his expression like water into a rag. “Will you be okay, Paba?”
Orrillimmirr gently tousled Sorrinn’s hair. “Always. One doesn’t make it to eight-hundred-seventeen years old being a fool.”
Sorrinn’s dumbfoundment was palpable. Dumbly staring off into the nth realm, all he could muster was a flabbergasted, “Huh?”
Eight… hundred, he said?