CHAPTER 27: SOUL FRAME
A few hours had passed since their conversation had began—Tyrel and Tina had just came back from their brief expeditions. Him and Myrin had spent the time conversing on magecraft and the different types of affinities that existed in the world. Apparently, the number was completely unknown. Some Magi scholars quoted it to be around 10,000 different types of affinities, some of which are combinations of smaller affinities. But even this number was seen as nothing but a guess—affinities were entirely dependent on the person’s true self and whatever manifested from it might not always conform to knowledge that was already known.
In Magi Society, there were countless rare cases in which a new Magus discovered that their affinities were unknown to the libraries they scoured. This meant that they were left with no choice but to research their affinity and create new magecrafts that function with it with nothing to guide them—they had to create new spellforms completely from scratch.
These spellforms, however, were almost always unstable. And the only way to test them was through usage. Because of this, magi that were born with unknown affinities usually never made it far in their careers—with no proper magecraft to use, they would dedicate their lives to paving new magecraft spellforms that would probably never be touched until a new magus with the same affinity as them was born in the future to carry on their legacy.
Spellform crafting, as it was called, was something not many magi ever delved into. Most resorted to simply reusing older magecraft from known grimoires found in countless magical libraries across the continent. Some of these grimoires were left in underground catacombs and labyrinths—relics of a past age. And even then, simply using well-documented magecraft was still a hard endeavor. The more complex the spellform, the harder it was cast, even with years of practice.
According to Myrin, Magi were ranked through the complexity of the spellforms they were able to cast. Every year, hundreds of Magi from across the continent journeyed to the Capital of Magic, Luvinica, to obtain their Magus Certificates. Countless organizations, most of which were secretive, appear there to find new recruits—though for the most part, they usually only selected individuals they were already familiar with.
A magi’s spellforms were created in layers, which were called circles. The more complex a spellform was, the more circles it held. And so, the ranks were recorded based on the number of circles a Magi could manifest.
Myrin for example was a 3rd Circle Magus. That was the highest number of layers he could manifest with his spellforms. Though, he did say he was planning on retesting this year in hopes of making it to next the layer.
Although a magecraft’s spellform was dependent on its circles to manifest correctly, other factors also applied, like the quality of the Soul Realm as well as its affinities. And even then, a person’s mental strength was also important. If a magus couldn’t focus hard enough to draw the spellforms in his mind’s eye and project them into their Soul Realm, the magecraft would fail.
Even if one held enough willpower to draw more complex magecraft, if their Soul Realm’s zone was too small or its shape wasn’t correct, the casted magecraft would probably still fail. And it was important for magi to expand their repertoire of magecraft because each circle added to the spellform increased the potency of the magecraft exponentially.
Soren however wasn’t very concerned with all of this. He knew that magecraft as a topic was something he could only realistically pursue after he had learned to utilize his Soul Realm more effectively.
After witnessing Tina and Tyrel fighting against the horde of Memory Void Husks, a certain question always popped up.
How exactly did they manage to fight so acrobatically? Tina was even able to subdue the headless ogre with a single kick. These were superhuman actions.
According to Myrin, physical enhancement magecraft did exist. However, Soren had never seen them using their Soul Realms to cast such magecraft.
Soren approached Tina who was stirring a large pot of stew for the Unblessed refugees. “Could I help you with anything?”
She looked at him with a somewhat annoyed expression. “Yes, don’t get in my way.”
“.....”
He smiled while rubbing his hair awkwardly. “Cough, I wanted to ask you something. Why do your melee attacks do so much more damage than say—Myrin? Are you using some kind of physical enhancement magecraft? The same with Tyrel.”
She looked at him for a second and smirked. “Why? Do you think being a magus is too boring?”
Soren chuckled. “I’m just curious.”
She lifted the spoon she was using to stir the pot with. “Use your [Eyes of the Fairy] to look at this spoon.”
Puzzled, Soren did as she asked. He observed the spoon through the Beyond. It was very strange. As he squinted closer, he could observe a weird looking field surrounding the spoon.
Suddenly, Tina jerked her hand in a swish-like motion—a gust of air formed that blew Soren’s hair in all directions.
Correcting his hair, Soren looked up at Tina in shock—her face was full of glee. “Unlike Magi, this is the power us Sentinels utilize—Soul Frames.
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“Soul Realms, as you have learned, manifest as a large bubble around a person’s form. However, have you not wondered where exactly this Soul Realm was whenever you weren’t using it?”
Soren thought about her question but came to no answer.
“The answer is inside you—literally. Soul Realms shrink to the size of your palm and stay within your body—usually next to or around the heart. You never feel this motion just as how a person doesn’t feel his organs working. Whenever your mind calls for the Soul Realm, it expands into what you have gotten used to seeing by now.”
Soren crossed his arms. “But what does this have to do with this Soul Frame you are mentioning now…”
She grinned. “A Soul Frame is the extension of that idea. Rather than expanding the Soul Realm in a zone around you to project magecraft, Sentinels like me and Tyrel envelope our Soul Realms around our bodies.
“A Soul Frame is usually referred to as the Fourth Layer. As you know, The Heart’s Shroud, The Echo of Mind, and the Veil of Perception represent our emotions, thoughts and senses respectively. But what about our bodily experiences, such as sickness, anatomy, and instincts? Those represent our existence as well, don’t they?”
Soren nodded.
“A Soul Frame merges the concepts of the Three Layers you know to theorize the existence of this Fourth Layer. And rather than projecting spellforms to cast magecraft, we project our raw anima to enact our will with our bodies.
“That is the way of a Sentinel.”
Soren thought for a second before asking. “So then does this mean I should also try forming a Soul Frame?”
She shrugged. “Forming a Soul Frame means losing out on the ability to cast magecraft entirely. You won’t be able to expand your Soul Realm around you anymore. This is what we call the Divergent Paths of Mystery. On one hand, keeping your Soul Realm as it is means becoming a Magus. On the other hand, reforging your Soul Realm into a Soul Frame means becoming a Sentinel. Once you make the decision, there is no turning back.
“I think you should wait until you meet our mistress before making a decision. This choice is also heavily dependent on what your affinities are and we can’t really test those out for you yet.”
Soren smiled. “You’re right.”
Before he could say anything else, she shoved a bowl of stew into his chest, almost blowing the wind out of it.
“Now stop bothering me and go pass out the stew to the others!”
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Soren spent the rest of the time at the camp helping out with the Unblessed as Tina had instructed him to do. Though, instructed was too lenient of a word. It was more like he was forced to. From one chore to the next, she refused to let him rest. Myrin had found the whole ordeal extremely funny, but that only lasted for 10 minutes until Tina started ordering him around as well.
Soren could swear he even saw the headless ogre give him a look of pity—Tina was treating Spirit Beasts better than them.
While passing out the food, Soren spent the time pondering over what he had learned. The knowledge on Soul Frames was exciting, but he also knew the risk of trying to form one was immense. Especially since the decision was permanent.
Weighing the benefits against the cons, A Soul Frame had the advantage of being much less mentally exhausting. Just as how an inactive Soul Realm was subconsciously existing within a Magi, a Sentinel’s Soul Frame was always subconsciously active and surrounding one’s body at all times.
In a way, it became just another organ or body part to a Sentinel. Simply thinking about strengthening their punches made them stronger. The same with their feet when they wanted to jump really high or run really fast—all of it depended on the concentration of anima they utilized in those moments of burst. It was all instinctual.
Magi on the other hand needed to not only keep track of their enemies in battle, but they also needed enough head-space to imagine the spellforms in their mind’s eye and project them onto their Soul Realm. And as Soren had seen, even Myrin who had tons of experience could fail to cast a magecraft if his mind was tampered with.
To win as a magi, preparation was key. And concentration was the door with which one passes or fails. If your concentration wasn’t strong enough, even with ten powerful affinities at your disposal, none of it would matter.
However, what Sentinels lose out on the most has to be versatility. With a Soul Realm, you are free to project any spellform of your choosing and cast hundreds of thousands of variations of magecraft if they match your affinity. An affinity for flames for example, could be used in a number of ways with the right magecraft—flame pillars, fireballs, flame arrows. As for Sentinels? The most they could probably do was manifest flames around their melee attacks or coat their weapons in their affinity.
Regardless of these comparisons, Soren was much more interested in another question. What effect would a Soul Frame have on his inherent ability?
The Hermit’s Eye. That was what his Soul Realm was called. Its ability to synergize with [Eyes of the Fairy] allowed him to view the beyond outside his own point of view. It was a strange ability, but Myrin had told him its usefulness will be immense once he learns about his affinities and starts casting magecraft on his own.
But if he had a Soul Frame, this ability would most likely be lost. Since a Soul Frame inhibits the form of one’s own body, his inherent ability would instantly be rendered useless—what’s the point of having the ability to see outside your own point of view when its range will only be a few inches around your body?
He wondered if the inherent ability would change once the person formed a Soul Frame. Maybe another ability would manifest that could take advantage of its new form.
Soren sighed—he knew Tina wouldn’t answer anything until he finished his chores. Though, it wasn’t entirely a bad thing.
During that time, he had met and talked with a lot of the unblessed. At first, they were hesitant to converse with him—many of them have never even seen a human before. None of that mattered though when said humans were feeding you food and providing you shelter.
“Soren, will I really be able to meet my brother again?” The timid yet soft voice of a little girl drifted from behind him. Soren looked down to find a blond haired child with freckles all over her nose—her left ear had a bloody bruise over it that had only just now started to heal.
Soren smiled meekly, “Of course. I am sure Tyrel will find him.”
“Tyrel? The shorty with a mean expression?”
“Y-yes…” He tried to hide his laugh.
Truthfully, Soren wasn’t sure what Myrin and the others were going to do with the unblessed. Taking them back to Yadria was probably impossible—they had escaped there for a reason. Myrin did tell him that the Aelloran authorities did take refugees from Yadria, but they were still not done with their mission and turning back the other way now would certainly be a bad idea since that would mean they would fail the mission the royal family had assigned to them.
And then there was the issue of this little girl, Liluth. She had apparently been attacked by a few Memory Void Husks when she and her mother were running away in the forest—in the process, she got separated from her older brother.
Tyrel had searched everywhere but never found them. It was looking fairly hopeless.