Solo A Void in my mind to be filled: Part II

[Clyde Sullins]

38 Spring 513 It had been several days since Clyde had last practiced his magics. He wanted to be reasonably skilled by the time he arrived in Ravok, or at least more skilled than someone newly initiated. Already he had learned a few quirks of it he had not known when he began, and realized some new uses of the magic of Voiding. He had rested a few days, and now was ready to take another voyage into the world of Voiding. He had some free time within the caravan, before he was needed, as they had settled in a spot for awhile to make camp. He thought on it for a moment, trying to decide what to do next... What should he do? The last time he had simply opened a void, and had realized a new technique, that of using a void to pull things inside... His current abilities with this pull though was very weak. Not to mention, he had discovered it by chance. Could he even do it again? Could it be controlled more finely than his first attempt at sucking things in? Hopefully these answers and more would be known to Clyde, before the day was done. With that, he set out upon his work, finding a grassy area, and taking out his Glyphing tools, ink and quill. Rolling up the sleeves of his robes, he left his arms bare, and filled his quill with ink in preparation to scrawl Glyphs on his skin. They would not last long before being rubbed off or ruined, but they would last long enough for this training. He drew a wavy line down each of his forearms a bit off center, starting just before the inside of his elbow, and going up to his wrist. He then copied the glyph on each arm with a second line a inch to the left of the first. Together they formed a passage for his djed to easily follow, up and out of his chest and lungs, down his arms, and into his hands. His hands were where he drew a pair of focus, one on each palm. He smiled for a bit, as he pondered what to do... Finally, he drew a triangle on each hand, with a dot in the middle, and a line extending out of each of the tips of the triangle. It was always fun thinking of new symbols.

[Clyde Sullins]

Clyde waited a few chimes for the Glyphs to dry, before he continued onward. he spent that time in meditation... Clearing his mind... Calming his breathing and making it slow and steady... He cleared his mind of all thoughts, simply focusing on the thought of nothingness, of the void, of the lack of substance. The only action he did was stand there, focusing on his breathing, in, out, in, out, nothing in the world but breathing and the unending emptiness of the void... Until a bird chirped over his right shoulder, and broke him from his meditative state... Petching birds... But still, he felt like it had helped. Perhaps he had not done as well as possible, but he felt more centered, and felt like... He understood the void a bit more... Was closer to it, just by focusing on the concept of it. Now that the ink was dry, Clyde opened his eyes, and held out each hand, palms up. He focused on a spot of almost empty space, which was filled with nothing but air. But while most would call that empty, he had realized from voiding, air was a substance just like anything else, and so the spot was not empty truly. It was chocked full of stuff. So, now it was his task to make that spot truly empty. He felt for his djed deep within him, he could almost feel the thrum of it as he breathed, letting out a gust of air from his mouth... Could almost feel the djed that gave him life. Without which, he would be a lifeless husk, as a stone. Now he would spend some of that precious djed, losing it, but in return doing something through magic, and getting just a bit better at using it. He focused on the thought of emptiness, of nothing, of a void even less substantial than the air before him, and set his djed upon that task, felt in some odd sense as the substance was pulled forcibly out of the space, and saw with his eyes as the nothingness sparked before him, flaring into non-existence. And thus a new portal to the Void was born.

[Clyde Sullins]

Clyde could feel a connection to the void, through his djed. Could feel the portal almost as if it was a part of him, something he could move and twist and command just like a limb. Just by willing it to do so. He took in a slow breath, and let it fill his lungs, as he fed a slow and steady trickle of djed to support the portal. To feed its never ending hunger. If he let it, it would feed off of his djed for all time, or until he died. But that would not do, letting it just sit there endlessly as a small dot of nothing, the size of a pinprick. As he fed it a small bit more djed, the portal began to widen a hairsbreadth at a time. It was a sliver of open blackness, looking into the void. It was a bit bigger... and bigger... He focused on the portal, feeling it with his mind, feeling the thrum of his djed as a small trickle of it bled away to keep the portal alive. He kept on feeding it, till it was about the size of his big toe. If he wanted to, he could stick the toe right in... But what would happen? Clyde honestly was not sure. But he was fairly certain, sticking his toe in would be a bad idea. Instead, he picked up a tiny twig, not even worthy of being called a stick. It was a thin little thing, probably broken off the end of a tiny branch. He picked it up, and stuck one end into the portal. After a good 2 or 3 inches had been fed in, he waited a chime, and then he pulled it back out. It looked the same but... Not quite the same... It had a odd sheen to it, almost like it was wet, but not quite. Intrigued, Clyde tapped the end of the stick on the ground. And watched as a few small bits of it shattered off the tip. The entire length of the stick that had been in the void, that had crossed through the portal, had been affected. Were before had been the glisten of dew, now lay frost. Taking out his waterskin, he poured a small spurt of water out over the twig. Most missed it, but a small bit hit on target. And when it did, it froze to the twig, into more frosty ice. Ice? Clyde was confused, but the only thing that made sense was that the twig was really, really, cold. What else but extreme cold could make water do that? He was just glad he had not stuck his toe in. Though he supposed it would not have been destroyed, just so long as he took it out before it was in there to long.

[Clyde Sullins]

Clyde looked at the open portal into the void before him. And he pondered... Why was it so cold? Surely there was a reason the void was cold. That it leeched the very warmth out of anything inside. But this cold, it was far beyond any normal cold he had experienced. Of course, he had never been to the cold of the far north which lay in a never ending ice. It was not just cold, it was utterly frigid. A sudden thought came to him. Ice Reimancy! Why, once he got good at voiding, he could make ice easily! He could simply supply the water, let it into the void for awhile, and take it back out as solid ice. He could make quite a lucrative business in such a manner, selling ice. For who in the temperate regions of Sylira, would not want ice in the warmer months? Petch, he should go down south to the desert, and sell it there. They had probably never even seen ice! Clyde spent a few moments pondering the thought, letting himself indulge in the fantasy of going down and becoming an ice merchant. But he knew he would not. He would not leave Ravok. It was his home now. It was were he belonged... So resolutely, he focused his attention back on the portal he had made, which had waned down almost to nonexistence in his absence. He fed it some more djed, a slow trickle, and built it back up to the size of his big toe. Then he felt out with his mind, felt into the intricacies of the portal, feeling for the familiar niche in which he had discovered the pull. He fed some djed into it, and felt as a gentle inhale of air blew across his hands, and into the void. He grabbed at the grass, and ripped up a handful and threw it up into the air over the void. It slowly fell back to the ground, all around the void, and directly above it. He watched as the pieces above it got sucked in, and as all the bits within several inches of the void also were consumed. The ones farther out were pulled closer, but they were not close enough to be pulled in, and once they got far enough away they escaped the pull altogether.

[Clyde Sullins]

Clyde watched as the last few bits of the grass landed on the ground, and as he let the pull slacken and die off... He could not help thinking he was missing something... Something was wrong with what he was doing. After a few chimes of thinking, and slowly feeding the portal djed to keep it alive, he realized what he was missing. It was a sense of scale. At this small scale, and with such a weak pull, he was safe from the effects. He could feel a gentle wafting of air being pulled in, but he was in no danger. The portal had pulled in all of the grass that had gotten close to it. Not just the ones on a collision course, but also for several inches around. But what if he scaled it up, and it was a human sized portal. Instead of those being blades of grass, it might be people. People, like him. If he had made a full sized void, and scaled up the pull to match the new size, he would have just been sucked into the void! He let out a curse at his mistake, and at the possibly lethal mistake he had just made. Admittedly, such a act was not within his grasp at the moment... But in the future, he needed to be far more careful of the void, and of pull. Or else he would find himself sucked right in. And that was not something he wanted to happen. He was just lucky he had attempted it at such a small scale, before he had made a fatal mistake. But what was he to do? Was a voider always at risk of being devoured by his portal, if he used pull? Surely not... Perhaps... Perhaps it could be controlled better? If he could only pull in a certain direction, then he would be in no danger. Feeling out with his mind for the portal, he let out a pulse of djed, reawakening its pull... But this time, he focused more on it, on the pull and its direction. He made sure to focus and divert the pull, so it only came out of the side of the portal away from him. He waited a few moments for it to settle, and then realized that though he could feel the increased djed drain of the pull, he felt no pull of air across his skin. He pulled another chunk of grass out of the ground, and threw it up into the air above the portal. This time, as the grass fell, not all of the grass close to the portal got sucked in. The bits directly falling into it did, and so did the bits of grass several inches out on the far side away from Clyde of the portal. But on his side, and on the left and right sides, the grass was unfazed. He let out a sigh, and cut off the flow of djed to the portal. He pondered over the things he had learned today, as he watched the portal slowly die unfed. He had learned how to better control a portals pull. He had learned he could control the direction the pull came on, so as to protect himself. And he had discovered the inside of the portal, the void, was cold. Very cold. Letting out another sigh, he watched as the portal winked out of existence. He felt drained from today's experimentation, but exhilarated at the same time for what he had come to grasp and understand. Who knew what he would learn the next time he worked at his voiding? -exit-

[Verilian]

. . Thread Award . . Clyde Sullins +1 Glyphing +1 Meditation +3 Voiding You Question My Logic? : XP explanation goes here. Lores: The Void is Cold, Getting better with Pull, An Idea for Ice Reimancy, Controlling the Direction of Pull Notes: Good thread, simple, yet effective. I'm always interested in seeing characters learn new things about magic. Notice As per the request of the Founders, threads cannot be graded unless your CS is up to date. This means you need to add threads to your thread list when you make new threads, keep your skills up to date, ledger, living expenses, ect. If you aren't up to date, you'll get a PM from me before i grade your thread. If you are up to date, disregard this notice.