Completed [The Midnight Gem] Becoming More Immersed IV

[Kelski]

Timestamp - 64th of Spring, 519 A.V.

Continued from: [The Midnight Gem] Becoming More Immersed III

By the Gods she was tired, even though she’d just woken up. Teaching this to The Gem was taking it out of her. But she knew it had to be done.

Talking the Midnight Gem into anything it didn't want to do was a struggle, and so she was relieved that The Gem actually wanted to do this… to learn. It was also nearly impossible to teach it new magics - and dangerous to do so - when she had no control over the building. But she was lucky, so very lucky, that The Gem was so agreeable and a being that Kelski could relate too. The core issue was that when she gave up control, she gave over complete trust and that was something The Midnight Gem for all its alien intelligence, did understand. And through those means, it was more than able to bridge the gap and understand exactly what it was Kelski was trying to do. Her lessons just weren’t about Reimancy. They were ethics and physiology and more Arcanology than she cared to admit.

There is more you are not telling me. Will you answer my question? Is Fire all I will ever have?

“No, fire isn’t all you will ever have unless you never give this magic another thought ever again. Res is a unique substance. It can be transmuted – that means turned into – one of four natural elements: earth, air, fire, water. And as you grow in your ability to manipulate fire, you will find you will be able to manipulate other elements too. One, then another, then when you get control of the first two, a third will come… and so forth. When you have mastered them all, you will be a Master Reimancer.” Kelski said softly, smiling.

“I only have two elements at the moment….” Kelski admitted quietly, then tossed a dollop of Res at the flickering candle flame. At the last moment she willed it to water, and the fire sputtered out. She laughed lightly, and The Gem reacted to relight it immediately. This time her control was worse though and a gout of flame like a torch went straight up out of the candle, as the building ignited too much Res.

“Woah… easy there. Pull it back, regulate it.” She coaxed, and the moment The Gem had the candle stabilized, Kelski snuffed it again by flinging out another ball of Res, transmuting it to air, and gusting it past the candle.

Another one ignited across the room, on the table. Kelski flung out her arm to counter it with more Res, when The Gem ignited her hearth. Kelski used both hands this time, flinging out both arms and producing a considerably larger amount of Res which she flung towards the hearth, transmuting it to water as she did so. A giant water ball splashed into the hearth, putting out the fire and she laughed.

They carried on for bells, laughing, lighting and putting out fires. Kelski alternated with air and water, finding the water made messes, and the air could tend to flare the fire and catch other things in its flames. When curtains went up in flame, The Gem was able to snuff the fire immediately by dominating the element and pulling all the power out of it.

Count: 549

[Kelski]

Kelski cheered, clapping her hands, and laughed spinning in the room. She’d already gotten lots of exercise, but this was more than she had hoped for. This was what she’d wanted. The Gem could control fire. She could be safe from any sort of fire hazards in Sunberth as long as she practiced and grew in her power.

The Sea Eagle flung herself against the hearth, hands outstretched, and pressed against the Gem, offering her physical comfort as well as opening their bond wide and sending it full of the love and joy she had for the structure. Kelski was truly blessed to have the Arch in her life. She stayed there for a long time before she returned to her seat. There was more to each.

Settling in, drinking the last of her now cool tea, she set the cup aside and sighed. “There’s more to talk about. For one thing, even with one element, you have a lot of options. With my water, for example, I can frost something….” She said, reaching out and touching the table. Res spread from her fingers transmuting to ice crystals that formed frost across the table. She concentrated and the frost thickened to ice then built up around the table slowly encasing it in ice.

Kelski could feel the draw on her djed as she automatically thickened the ice, manipulating the djed into res as fast as she could. Then she drew more res forth, started a breeze, and sent it skittering around the room. It stirred up ash in the hearth, drying the wet mess there, and then was able to sweep up the debris and usher it out the window all while Kelski concentrated.

She turned back to the thick ice on the table and with a touch more of res applied, it transmuted to water and splashed to the floor. The liquid she gathered up with the same breeze she had moving around and ushered the rain back out the same open window like a driving vertical gale.

Sitting back, she gestured at the now dry table and clean hearth. “You can do so much with just a couple of elements.” Kelski stated plainly, hoping she really demonstrated the truth to The Gem. “Where it gets crazy is when you combine elements.” Kelski said softly. She thought a moment, not sure how to explain it.

“These are called para-elements. You’ve seen lightening? Mages can make it when they combine fire and air. That ice I was playing with? That’s water and air combined. And there’s another substance, a sort of molten thing… you know what my metal looks like when you heat it up and it becomes red and runny? Some earth does that as well. That earth combined with fire, makes a molten rock called Lava. You can make mud with earth and water. The possibilities are endless. You can make a deadly mud if you add enough fire into it to make it scalding hot. It will burn and kill living things.” Kelski said, as if it didn’t matter.

It didn’t.

If something attacked her Arch Daughter, they deserved to die. And that her daughter now held a power she could manipulate if she practiced meant a lot to the Kelvic.

Count: 544

[Kelski]

“The more you practice, the more you will gain control. If you don’t practice, you can lose control easily. We’ll play more of these games, every day if necessary, and we’ll invent new ones. Its good for all of us to practice. Keep lighting your fires. Use the hearth where no damage will be done. Be cautious lighting candles around burning material. You must have better control than a newly birthed Reimancer to be confident. The elements can be truly deadly, Gem. Once you release them on the world, they are not always easily controlled. You can accidently burn Sunberth down if you are not careful. Lightning is virtually impossible to control and you can get shocked and dead from it as easily as we’ve seen trees struck and killed. Just because its YOUR res you conjured it with, doesn’t mean its your element. You have to earn it. Simple things are easy and not much of a danger, but creating a flashy wall of fire around your structure can easily harm you and cause overgiving.” Kelski said, looking thoughtful.

You told Vasin about Overgiving in terms of his morphing. I remember the warning signs. But what does that mean for me if I use too much djed, turning it to res, and feel harm?

“I don’t really know. I don’t think this is something anyone has ever done before. Those of the flesh feel injury of their flesh like wounds. I would guess you would feel wounds of the structure. Cracks in your frame maybe, instability in your consciousness, that sort of thing? I don’t want you to find out. I want you to be cautious, always.” Kelski said thoughtfully, and went on thinking it could get even worse. “For all we know, your sort of overgiving symptoms could result in your death. Mages die of overgiving all the time… flesh and bone mages. So be smart about it. Proceed with caution.” She said thoughtfully, then took another seat on the couch, tucking her bare feet up under her.

“If you do too much and wound yourself, tell me so we can get you repaired. I want to take extensive notes in case we teach Barn Reimancy too. It might well be something we do. But I want to see how you handle it first. And I want him to be in a happier place as well. He’s not happy as he is now. And since we will be moving soon, I’m hoping as a dock he will be much more appreciated. I plan to build a giant boathouse he can inhabit and host… maybe guard boats instead of animals. It might suit him better.” Kelski mused.

I want the animals. I like them. I don’t see why you didn’t just connect the barn to me. That way I could be both places at once. Watching them. Watching you. Its not too much for me. I get lonely and the animals are up at all hours.

“I will remember. I just don’t know what our new place will be like. If possible, I will make sure the stables will be connected. I don’t think that’s unreasonable. The animals like you too. I know you do well with the dogs and some of the other things that have been here.” Kelski said gently. Then she looked thoughtful and leaned back.

Count: 560

[Kelski]

“Reinmancy. I need to get back to this. Life has been so busy lately its easy to get distracted and not teach you. But you deserve to be taught, and taught right, not ignored in the business of this packing and planning a move.” Kelski mused, then regathered her thoughts. What did she tell The Gem and what was less important for a Reimancer building than a Reimancer person? Was there truly a difference?

She thought hard and remembered how Gilthas had broken down the levels of learning. “When you are just starting to learn… when you just have one element, making Res is rather slow. Controlling fire is pretty hard and restricted. With us… people like me… it’s a couple of armlengths away though you can throw res further. I’m not sure how a building will throw something, but I will leave that up to you. You most likely will have to experiment quietly and on your own. I know Gilthas told me that fire reimancers can produce a ball of res in their hand, throw it from them, then will it to ignite with fire when its whirling away from them. It’s a fireball of sorts. That should translate into something you can do in a similar fashion. I’m just not sure how. And going back to the Res again. The Res production will speed up as you get better at it. But for us, it is like it takes time for our bodies to grow used to manufacturing it. Its much like a master jeweler like myself can make a cabochon in a few minutes because we’ve made thousands of them, where as a novice jeweler might take all day.” Kelski threw it into terms The Midnight Gem was used too.

Then she continued on, knowing there was more to say.

“Once you get confident with fire and feel another element coming on, you can now utilize the second element and combine it with the first. You will get faster and faster at generating and manipulating Res into what you want and need it to do. You will have to think less about it and your body and mind will be more automatic in its execution. Your speed and accuracy will increase, and so too will the distance you can control the Res from.” She said, then added.

“You’ll eventually get the third element. You can blend in any number of the three combinations at that point and you can affect a far larger area – maybe a whole big great room or even a small building – and your control, speed, and distance will be amazing.” Kelski added, knowing The Gem understood.

“Once you have mastered all four elements, you can control Res and use Reimancy almost effortlessly. You can control all your elements within sight distance and whatever limiting factors there are about your range of distance… meaning however fast you can get Res to where you can see means that’s how fast you will be throwing magic around.” Kelski added, stifling a yawn.

They’d been at this discussion for hours, almost the whole of the day, and that meant other things needed to be done… chores, work in her workshop, that sort of thing. She needed to wrap up this lesson, and she did so with just one more point she wanted to make.

Count: 558

[Kelski]

“There’s just one more thing I want to talk to you about, Gem. As a Mage, you can now attract the elements you control in addition to transforming them. If you have a strong enough willpower, you can will this into being… calling fire to you. This is a separate power and doesn’t always happen in Reimancers – in only the best of them. I can call wind and water and manipulate it if it is already there.” Kelski said, walking over to the kitchen to fill her tea cup with water.

She then gestured, coaxing it out of the cup to swirl in a ball the volume of the cup in her hand. She made it dance, spinning around and around while holding the ball shape. “Gilthas can do this as well. You come from a strong djedline… an old one. We are the Avancalas.” She turned and gestured, causing the water to form the spiral and then the two slashes through it.

“The spiral is the power of our Well…. The slashes through it meaning that we are not restricted by whats in our well. We can use what’s all around us. The tails reaching out from the slashes mean that we always seek new ways. And the tail from the spiral on its own? We will always walk apart from other mages. Don’t forget that, Gem. You are Avancalas now. You are as much one of us as anyone who bears our blood or our magic. Two Avancalas mages inducted you. Don’t forget that. The K’etir might own a corner of the Architectrix Magic, but this is yours outside of that. And we are strong… as strong as we can be and growing stronger because our minds our open.” Kelski said, tapping her head with a finger.

“We have you. We didn’t hold you apart, but welcome you in our circle with open arms sharing our gifts and our power with you. Because we are far stronger in numbers than standing alone.” Kelski said softly.

She then felt it… the floodgate open between her and The Midnight Gem. Love washed her. Acceptance washed her. The value The Gem placed in her swept over her. And despite how thrown away she’d been in life in times past… in the here and now she was more than K’etir… more than Avancalas. She was so much more.

There was truthfully no luckier mage alive. Kelski could understand why her family kept this magic a secret. Buildings were powerful forces, sentient, and they could be soldiers in a war that no one expected or really recognized. They were guardians and teachers; shelters of enormous power and their potential was almost limitless. Kelski was astonished that her brother had trusted his very young Kelvic daughter with the secret of Architectrix, to travel so far with a book and a sliver… then she wondered, almost like being struck by lightning… if it was some last-ditch effort to save the magic. Was he in danger and at risk of death? Was he ensuring that this lost almost mythological power be passed on to family in a desperate act of last-minute salvation?

No… no… from what Dess and Ember said their family was strong. Surely there had been no threat to them… she had to be wrong. He just trusted his daughter. That was all. That was what it had to be. Kelski let the worry fade away, even though she sensed The Gem pick up on it and start to reassure her though then hesitate.

Neither of them actually knew the truth. And neither of them had a way to find out… at least not yet.

Count: 611

[Kelski]

G R A D E S

Kelski-

Architectrix +5, Reimancy +4, Teaching +5, Arcanology +3, Psychology +2, Logic +3

Reimancy: Demonstrating Elements, Teaching: Reimancy – The levels of magic use, Reimancy: Games to Practice, Teaching: Explaining Para elements

PM me with questions or concerns.