(III)

I spent the rest of the evening thinking about everything really hard until my brain really did start going in circles. Then I completely washed my hands of the whole thing and went to my workshop to lie down.

On the roof.

Back on Earth, the number of stars visible with the naked eye was 9,110. I hadn't made much of a dent in counting these ones, and I probably wouldn't do an accurate count without a reflective pool, what with the way the sky kept changing and moving. But I could already tell there were quite a bit fewer visible lights on Azeroth. Visibility wasn't the reason, the atmosphere was almost identical and light pollution wasn't a thing where we lived. The reason was the complete lack of a Milky Way equivalent up there. There was also a nebula not unlike a blue-purplish oort cloud that travelled across the sky every night, but even that one was fairly diffuse and small by astronomical standards. Also, it was about as far removed from everything else in the sky as the star system was. At the very least, this meant Azeroth was not located in a spiral galaxy. It may, in fact, not be part of a proper galaxy at all. In which case those stars in the sky might not be stars at all, but themselves whole galaxies. Every single one.

That sort of thing would mess with space navigational prospects something fierce, I thought silently. I always wondered why the Burning Legion didn't just come over here on spaceships. Is this why? Distance was more of a suggestion when you could literally teleport through dimensional hopping, but if there wasn't any sort of navigational reference… Can they just not navigate here conventionally?

It certainly made more sense than the idea that the Burning Legion had never encountered a spacefaring civilisation. They had colossal mechs for crying out loud.

Slowly, I let sleep take me. I had long since stopped suffering discontinuity of consciousness when passing from awake to asleep and back. It was something I'd managed a few times even back in my previous life, including the last time I closed my eyes. This time, though, as I watched the golden glow of the Light emanate more and more from the stars downward, I let myself drift and willed nothing.

I woke up at dawn with my mind clear of any worries that I still hadn't even the foggiest of why I kept failing at alchemy. Instead, I jumped off the roof and went over to feed the fire. The elementals gave me all their attention but were reluctant to leave the warmth of the cauldron. After the fire had been stoked, I went and brought more water too. Then I stood watching them and pondered all of the prior day's failures to soothe the spirits' hunger with the Light.

"I have an idea. It might take a while. Try not to swarm me?"

~Hunger. Certainty of failure. Curiosity.~

Boosting their willpower made them cheeky, the little buggers.

Closing my eyes, I called the Light to fill me, fill all the gaps between all parts of me, and followed it with my Mind past my Form through my Soul to my Spirit. Not something I'd deliberately messed with before, but this was a pressing enough need, wasn't it? The Light chimed softly through me, which was confirmation enough. The need wasn't big enough for outright sacrifice though, and I didn't really need to, did I? After all, isn't the Spirt something that can be grown and cultivated too?

I called all my ideas and memory and comprehension. What the Spirit was. What it did. What it could do. Memories of a past life. Concepts I couldn't put into words and those I could. Words I couldn't give voice to and those I could. Even if I hadn't had an eon's worth of picking my way through my beliefs, concepts, opinions, wounds and fears, the Light didn't need perfection to help you, did it? Also, how many chi-using pandas could really claim enlightenment? Maybe one or two, that's how many. Of thousands that could still break rocks with their bare hands. All because they knew to shape and mould their Spirit.

I followed the Light to the eighth part of myself that was the Inspiration. I gave my Inspiration all the memories and ideas and understanding of Spirit. What could be achieved by it, with it and along with it. And I waited. The best idea I could ever have bloomed in my mind with crystal clarity and I bid the Light DO.

Deep within me, the Light ceased being a mere buttress for my will and began to truly nourish my Spirit.

It was like the greatest injection of adrenaline, except for every part of me except the bone and flesh. My spirit, for the first time through something other than time and experience, began to grow. Faster than ever. Faster than I needed. Fast enough, maybe, to finally give some relief to my little bevy of little Spirits of Water and Flame.

The elementals went into a frenzy. They spewed out of the cauldron and rushed at me, pressed against me, blurring my sight, stealing my breath, sucking at my warmth in ravenous desperation. The good night's sleep had let me remember just why Azeroth's elementals were so extremely violent and chaotic. It was the world soul. Azeroth's world-soul was large and grew quickly, it was what drew both the Old Gods and the Titans to it. But because the planet's world-soul developed so quickly, it consumed much of the Fifth Element at a rate faster than the planet generated it, the very Spirit energy of the planet, the one thing that the elements needed to live. And as Spirit became more and more scarce, the elemental spirits of Azeroth became more and more erratic until they became extremely violent, destructive and chaotic by nature.

The Light sustained me where my body would have gone into shock without air. The heat was no problem, asserting control over my thermal conduction and convection was one of the first things I ever did. The little clouds were turning into a chaotic mist and dust devil with every passing moment, but I didn't need to see. Not for this. The way that the Pandaren applied their Spirit came about as a reaction to the sha threat, and thus had the main purpose of inherently encouraging harmony within themselves and everyone else. They successfully quelled their own elementals as a side effect of their own necessary pursuit of peace. I couldn't do that, the playful, peaceful, and at worst mischievous elementals of Pandaria were the result of thousands of Pandaren practicing of Spirit-emanating inner harmony over thousands of years. But consciously using the energy of the Spirit to encourage chaotic elementals to calm down and cooperate, well, shamans have been doing that since forever, haven't they? More than long enough for reality to know how. For the Light to know how. For me to know how, now.

I drew runes in the air around me. The Light patterned around my feet like a star unfolding across the entirety of the earth. My Spirit flowed outwards in a cascade of life-giving energy that blanketed the world.

The spirits calmed and drifted outward, unspooling like mist, calm and sated for the first time in their whole existence.

I stood and waited for them to drink their fill until they finally knew peace.

~… Satiety… Torpor… Wonder…~

"I love the smell of a new avenue of experimentation in the morning."

~… Satiety… Torpor… Wonder…~

"I think I'll call it Aura of Vigor."

~… Satiety… Torpor… Wonder…~

Within me, my Spirit fed on the nurturing Light and grew ever quicker than it nourished in turn the world. "Reality-defying feats always make me talk like a two-bit bard even in my head. What do you think, little ones, should I start writing epics?"

~… Satiety… Torpor… Wonder…~

"That's it! The dragons mean something noble in alchemy, but I actually know what most of them are doing to Azeroth, half of which is very much not noble!" And half of the remaining half was debatable at best. "I need to figure out new metaphors. Or how to do alchemy without symbolic metaphors." Could you even do that? The whole point of them was to synchronise your own development with the transmutations to achieve transmutation of the self. At least that's what it was back on Earth, I was pretty sure. "Oh well, something to figure out later. You'll help me, won't you little ones?"

~Satiety. Wonder. Anything for you.~

"You're perfectly right, I haven't really done enough to be worth an epic. Guess I'll go remedy that right now."

~Satiety surprise nowaitdontgo!~

I stopped in place, surprised too. "Come now, it's not like I'm leaving right this instant-"

~ Satiety alarm dontgo ~

I stared.

~ Satiety alarm dontgo ~

Taken from Royal Road, this narrative should be reported if found on Amazon.

"Now you're just being dramatic."

~ Dongo dontgo dontgo~

"Or you'll what?"

~… … …~

I nodded. "Good. Admitting you don't know something is the first step on the path of learning." It was also good that they hadn't immediately become possessive maniacs. "I'll be back in a few days. I'm pretty sure you can last that long, you don't actually lose mass or energy unless you consciously expend it, right?"

~… Satiety. Gratitude. Longing.~

… I guess I didn't need to go right this moment. "Alright... Let's spend the day together."

~Satiety. Wonder. Joy.~

We spent the day together. It was basically like a normal day, except everyone around me was more energetic and driven, enough that even the Handy Trio gave me meaningful looks even if they didn't comment on it. Also, there was a constant trail of little clouds constantly fighting over who got to hug me next and otherwise competing for my attention. It was honestly kind of nice. They buoyed your mood like nothing else. It made me wish I had my own kids someday.

Well. Thoughts for the future.

Alas, the matters of the city beckoned, and so did the increasingly endangered opportunity I'd sensed previously. Which felt even more endangered after a good night's meditation with proper mental parameters to guide the Light towards more comprehensive revelation. As in 'will be tragically and irrevocably lost by tomorrow at lunchtime' endangered.

I was ready to leave at the crack of dawn the next day. I'd already retrieved what ledgers I needed from my study and had just finished collecting the newest samples from my workshop. I was just finishing fastening them tight into the rear basket of my custom-designed mountain bike when the Misty Nine floated over.

"Sorry, children, Dad really does have business today. And probably the rest of the week. You be good to Grandmother, alright?"

~Satiety. Hope. Wecanhelp!~

I paused. That almost sounded like words even as the added meaning appeared in my head. They were really making an effort. Also, now that I think about it, was it really so good that something could put thoughts in my head so easily? Sure, I could instantly tell what was foreign and what was mine, and I could call the Light to scour me clean whenever I wanted. But who's to say I'll always know to do it? Who's to say stuff like this can't be louder? Who's to say more mature elementals or whatever else couldn't be quieter about it too, more subtle? That was literally how the Fel and Void worked.

The Light backlit a spark of Inspiration deep behind my mind in the depths of my Memory. An image emerged through it until it could see it in my Mind's eye. It was a symbol I knew I should recognize, it was my own memory after all – oh! An Icelandic stave! I'd completely forgotten about them. This one was… the Helm? Yes, that's it. Aegishjalmur. The Helm of Awe. The stave that protects from all mind influences.

Something shifted in the destiny of the world. I went still as stone, almost unbelieving of the implications. When I looked into the dark of the unknown future, the Light seemed to reach that slightly bit further.

I had to put this to use immediately, but how? I don't have a helmet and even if I did it could be removed – oh. Never mind, I'll just etch it into my skull.

In case it wasn't clear, I came even by my Inspiration honestly.

I called on the Light. I'd have expected it to be at least somewhat contrary to what basically amounted to deliberately self-inflicted scars, but it didn't even waver. Then I remembered that Lightforging is a thing. I guess a little bodily modification is nothing next to that.

"We are all inadequate vessels," I murmured the words that Alonsus Faol told me, all those months ago.

Golden light flickered over and out of me, I could see it shimmer upon the little clouds and on the grass. My skull itched. It felt like it was burning. But no matter how hot the burning became, pain never followed it. The Light, as always, made short work of such paltry discomforts.

When it was over and done with, I smiled wryly. The Light and my own Inspiration were making common cause to deprive me of reasons not to give the little clouds a chance.

I looked at them and deliberated on what to say. One the one hand, helpful spirits were rarer than an oasis in the middle of the desert on this planet. On the other hand, these nine were babies. Should I or should I not make a conscious choice to not project the limits of a human lifecycle on them? "Alright. You have one chance to persuade me. Make it good."

~Satiety. Gratitude. Excitement!~

The spirits blended together, then unfolded wide, diffusing until I could barely see them, then further until I couldn't tell them apart from the air at all. I might have feared for their continued survival, but I could still feel them there, and when I called the Light I could even see them again, a latticework of fluttering molecules interwoven with Light and Life stretching ever broader. Much broader. This is what healthy spirits should really be. Far-reaching, imperceptible but present. Greater and more expansive by the moment. Longer too. Longer and longer as their reach extended from me upwards upon the wind and suddenly I could see what they could see. Knew what they could hear. Knew what they could feel. Everything they perceived. The entirety of Alterac Valley from a bird's eye view, high in the sky above.

"Far Sight," I murmured. Joyful laughter bubbled out of me then, and I indulged it fully. "Oh, you're just full of surprises, aren't you? Well, you've convinced me and then some. Well done."

~Satiety. Smugness. Joy.~

I brought my bike out from the shed, pumped the tires and then pondered my cowboy hat. But eventually I decided it just wouldn't work without a proper horse so I left it on the hook.

I shouldered my rifle, holstered my pistol at my right hip, strapped my shotgun to the down tube scabbard, finally mounted my contraption and made my goodbyes.

Then I came back less than one hour later, ran to my study and quickly wrote down what just came to me before I forgot, I should really stop forgetting to double-check that I actually have my notebook and pencil on me before I go anywhere. "The gnomes didn't harness nuclear power, it was the Titans! All those robots, there's no way they run on anything less than a nuclear power reactor. I bet they did something to the Arcane so it didn't interfere with it, bloody hackers!"

Immediately I felt better. Not having a reason to develop an inferiority complex was a load off my mind. Sure, enlightenment precluded that as it did all other mental traps, but maintaining it still took some deliberate self-reflection.

Now to get a move on before the endangered opportunity really is tragically and irrevocably lost by lunchtime.

Normally I'd take the roundabout path going through the eastern pass. It was the region's major trade route, and in fact Alterac City was built so high up in the mountains specifically so it would straddle it and derive all the prosperity thereof. It was the major root cause of its tension with Stromgarde, as the former capital of Arathor had previously enjoyed unburdened trade with both Dalaran and Lordearon.

Alterac Valley was, on paper, Alterac's highly developed back yard. In reality, though, it was the site of a myriad different competing interests, as there was no noble house in the country that didn't own some share of land or business in the area, the mineral wealth was as abundant as the king's court was decadent. This meant that, since Alterac nobility was the most cutthroat anywhere in human lands, the valley was actually an eternal hotbed of 'accidents', strife, disputes and 'bandit' activity. All that without counting the uncomfortable number of man-eating wolves and bears constantly attracted by the smell of blood from the various corpses regularly left behind after such 'banditry' and 'accidents'.

I live in the worst country.

At least there wasn't any slavery.

My standards have gone to shit.

Alas, the valley was where the Light insisted I would find the endangered opportunity of nebulous origin, so that's the path I took.

I found it just as the summer sun neared its zenith. Far Sight allowed me to see it around two different bends in the cliffside path and over a mile off. An ambush site. People set up to cause a rockslide. A noble and his retinue just five minutes off on the path below. And something stalking him from high above. Something I only saw because spirits could see the unseen.

I almost drove my bike down the ravine.

What the hell is a val'kyr doing here?