Chapter 209 - A Heart of Ice (Patreon)

Jiran could instantly tell that something was wrong. The fog inside his soul-space was rapidly being devoured through his gate, but almost half of it was blasted away by the rapid spinning of the two massive rings. With a thought, he adjusted their rotation, and a portion of the rejected fog was visibly drawn through the first of the two rings then into his soulwall, rather than the dark hole that led to his soul. A tingling warmth so minute he could have imagined it trickled out of the tap in his neck to spread across his shoulders. Whether imagined or real, the feeling was beyond euphoric, and like a man given water in the desert, he desperately adjusted the speed of the rings until the most fog possible was being drawn into his soulwall and not his soul.

Despite his best efforts to ignore it, a deeply distracting elation was bubbling within his chest. A grin painfully cracked his frozen cheeks but he couldn't have cared less. His focus sharpened and every external stimulus was ignored as he dove into the process of accepting his element. The difficulties didn't relent, within moments, Foresight sent him a powerful warning. The soulwall near the gate was quickly becoming a solid glacier, frozen and hard as a rock. He zipped his mana-imbued consciousness along it, finding the area where the ice stopped and the typical cloudy surface began. The ice was rapidly being absorbed by the normal portions of the wall but not nearly fast enough to keep up with the rate his gate was drawing in the fog. 

He tried willing the wall to quicken the pace of absorption, which predictably had no effect. Injecting mana and aura into it with intent was equally futile. Scratching his shadowy chin, he gave in with a shrug and returned to the gate. Reluctantly, Jiran slowed the rings’ rotations until Foresight calmed down. He zoomed back and forth between the edge of the frozen portions of his soulwall and the gate, finding the perfect speed where absorption spread evenly without solidifying any portions of the wall. Now, the cloudy surface was rapidly taking on a lighter hue, becoming more like the fog it was taking in. Satisfied, he maintained the rotation and pulled the rest of his mental faculties back into reality. Mana Confluence healed the recent frost burn that had built up across his chest and back.

Guess it's going to take a while after all. I already feel so much better. I doubt the cave’s gotten warmer, which means I'm developing an immunity. Interesting that the gate is facilitating the absorption. Madra must have built it that way on purpose. Is that why her mana didn’t interfere for once? How is this done for people who don't have a gate? They must just deal with the fog, or whatever element they chose, crashing into their soulwall repeatedly. I bet that takes forever. Not only that, finding a place with an element imbued with a soul attack is probably incredibly rare. Do they have to make their own?

Jiran could easily imagine a tier seven sealing themselves in a dark cave somewhere and ever so slowly creating a space suffused with the optimal element and then absorbing it into their soulwall over a dozen years. 

It seems like there’s always something to be gained from the arenas outside of raw boosts in attributes. What’s their true purpose? Why test people like this while continually making them stronger? In fact, it seems like all of Madra, or at least what I’ve seen of it, shares that same philosophy. The world and its system are far too structured for it to be random. I keep getting distracted… doesn’t help that this is so easy now that I’ve got the hang of it, just time-consuming. Oh well, better random thoughts than falling back asleep!

And so, Jiran allowed his thoughts to take him where they may as time flowed ever forward.

It was easy to lose track of the hours in the arena; without the timer ticking down, and the map in his interface revealing nothing but white static, Jiran was left with the inching advance of his aspect across his soulwall as the only measurement of time’s passage. He certainly felt like he was making great progress, but he wouldn’t know for sure until he made it back to his friends. Several times, he found himself on the verge of dozing off. Even with his growing acclimation to the element, he was certain that succumbing to sleep would lead to a sure death.

A single mind was more than sufficient to maintain the spinning of his gate. He rotated out which mind was in charge of the task every few minutes in an attempt to keep things fresh and stretch his brain. The rest of his thoughts were chaotic, directionless, and inevitably dragged him back to Mayalyn and Olive.

I shouldn’t be worried. I left them with all the formations they could possibly need and Mayalyn knows how to use the new ones. The more numbers the Graymin throw at them, the stronger they’ll become. And with the portals open, they can always retreat back to the Forest of Melodies. If not for that numbered guy showing up and ruining eve—

A rumbling crack, loud enough to rattle Jiran’s bones, echoed through the cave for several long seconds. He was on his feet in a flash. Stiff, frozen muscles were torn and healed. Mana surged out of him, ready to be thrown in any direction at a moment's notice. Despite the sudden scare, he maintained the optimal rotation of his gate, the process so engrained by this point he probably could have continued even if he did fall asleep. When nothing jumped out to eat him, Jiran gradually calmed and then moved around, questing for the source of the sound. 

Whatever the cause was, he couldn’t spot it with his naked eyes, and with his aura sealed to hide him from the revenants, he couldn’t check inside the walls. He considered pulling it out since the beasts didn’t want anything to do with the caves but in the end, it was a risk he wasn’t willing to take. He was only halfway done with acquiring his aspect, to be forced to flee this perfect environment could be catastrophic to his progress. With a new fear of being interrupted if he took too long, Jiran folded his legs beneath him and focused with renewed effort. He fine-tuned the spinning of the gate which was an arduous process as the assimilated portion of his soulwall was growing with every passing minute so the trek back and forth took longer and longer.

A short time later, another rumble was accompanied by a fissure that split the wall to his left, running from the ceiling several meters above and halfway through the floor. The split was large enough to stick his entire arm inside and the sight of it sparked a disturbing realization. 

This cave might actually be alive. The way it responded to me creating fire, and now the cracks in the walls… I know density is sentient, and this place is packed with enough mana to actively attack my soul. Maybe I'm not just consuming its attack to empower my soulwall, but actually killing it by draining its fog. Will I finish before the cave… dies? Can living caves even die? I could swap to a different one. No, those other versions of cold weren’t right and I get the feeling I’ll taint my ideal if I try another cave.

Another crack appearing, this one stretching all the way across the ceiling, lit a metaphorical fire under Jiran’s ass. He stood and dove into the very depths of the cave, to the coldest spot at the far wall, and placed his hands upon it. His skin instantly turned to ice. He broke down the frozen flesh with Mana Confluence and pulled it, along with the energy used to damage it, into his tap. The fog in his soul-space tripled, crashing against his soulwall with a voracious fury that caused fresh waves of blistering chills to radiate from his neck.

He wasn’t given time to revel in his successful gamble. The cave rumbled and shook, more fissures appearing across every surface as though it were a pane of cracked glass. Along with the near-complete shattering of the cavern, the temperature rose significantly to the point his skin felt a true touch of warmth.

No! I don’t have enough yet. This cold is mine!

Jiran’s aura exploded from his skin. The fact it felt no discomfort in the rapidly warming air only furthered his desperation. He latched onto the walls, floor, and ceiling. His aura dug into every crack, sucking out the marrow that was his ideal version of cold. A connection formed when he reached deep into the walls; he could feel the cave dying as he drained it but that was the nature of Madra. Many died so that one could ascend.

The cave rejected him, attempting to pull further away while protecting something precious that Jiran could instantly tell he needed. He followed after it, his aura slithering deeper into the cracked ice and rock. But they were far deeper than anything natural and there were hundreds of them. Jiran gave up on directly chasing it through its territory. Instead, he flooded his aura into every single crevice except the one it had fled down. Just when the will of the cave thought it was safe, aura pounced on it from every direction.

Jiran grinned viciously as the core of its power was revealed: An icy heart that pulsed with a dull glow. He grabbed it with his aura and it fought back with the intensity of a cornered animal. It was Enthralling Touch that gave him the edge in their struggle. He grabbed the solid block of freezing energy and pulled it into himself with a defiant roar. It flowed down his tap like it was coming home and nestled into his soul-space where it released steady and consistent waves of fog that washed against his soulwall.

Jiran flipped around, his back sliding down the fractured wall as he sat, heaving and exhausted. His aura was safely back inside him and he could only hope that his efforts, and the rupturing of the cave, hadn’t attracted any of the revenants. Even after what felt like several hours passed, he didn’t drop his guard. 

With the source of the cold inside him, he was positive he had enough of it to complete his aura’s transformation. The heart grew weaker with each freshly released wave of fog that was absorbed. Yet Jiran’s soulwall grew stronger in equal measure. He could feel the effects across every aspect of his being. The cells that constituted his muscles and bones were reforged, though how exactly he couldn’t tell. His skin became stiffer and more resilient. 

Yet the biggest change was in his mana. The energy was changing on a fundamental level, similar to how it always inverted when he fed his Manabody. It didn’t feel any stronger or move more quickly, but there was a vast difference in the sensations he was receiving from it. Before, he could get a general idea of what his mana touched, almost like having a million minuscule eyes and fingers to feel and interact with the world. Now, the places his mana felt practically crawled with tactile feedback. As the transformation continued, he was even able to sense the outlines of the framework’s synapses, something he could only ever perceive with his aura before.

How is the framework a mystery to the empire if acquiring an aspect allows you to feel it with your mana? Maybe they can’t? Is what I’m experiencing a Remalonzy thing? We are supposedly masters of mana.

Without warning, a large ripple started at his gate and swept outward across his soulwall. The icy surface was devoured in the wave of motion, and in its wake, a pristine and nearly clear wall was revealed. The iceheart still thumped steadily in his soul-space, though now the fog it released shied away from his upgraded soulwall as though terrified of it. Jiran’s excitement was dulled by his drowsy minds. He held back attempting to wield his aspect for the first time, giving the ripple time to pass over the entirety of his soulwall. Considering how large it was, that would take quite a while.

It’s done. I did it. I can finally rest.

The hectic, non-stop events of the last few hours or days weighed heavily upon him. Through bleary vision, he used Elemental Castigation to form a burrow in the wall. He sealed himself inside and gratefully curled into a ball to fall fast asleep.