I spent the last few days in Mossford before I had to take the boat to the Isle of Crysite working and training, mainly focusing on rounding out the last few spells that I had yet to bring up to snuff. Ingraining Sky Dragon’s Senses assisted in the technique of casting my senses through natural winds while also expanding their range, Enhance Forging gained the same effect as my old cavern dragon ring of improving any spell that created solid mana, Spatial Tripwire helped refine my spatialsense’s ability to pick up on the movement of things within my mana senses, and Mass Harvest improved the regeneration of my life mana.

  I continued to work on sketching my new spells as well, though they didn’t take many massive leaps and bounds, just moving a few spells to mastery through rapid repetition. They’d need more use before I could actually ingrain them. Starfish Regeneration was close, but I needed something to tip me over the barrier.

  I used the tools that the fungal folk had gifted me to train my senses, control, and the Depths of Starry Night, but I was still a long way away from getting my third gate power to automatically cycle the Depths of Starry Night technique. It made sense – third gate was so much bigger than the first two, of course a mana meditation would also take more time and effort to reach the point of mastery.

  Meadow checked over the mulch, and assured me that as long as I only used it to assist in breaking from early to mid third gate, it wouldn’t negatively impact my power, so I poured a dose of it out over the soil of my life gate, though I actually didn’t start digging yet – I wanted to at least have the kirin’s spell in place first, and I was incredibly close. I figured that I could use the boat ride to chip through the last bit of tile, and then start digging.

  Ikki and I worked together for a few hours, training with the refinements to my body, using my tail in combat, and getting a handle on the combination of Foxarmor and Tortoise Time. The use of my tail surprised me, but he had me working to use it almost like an extra hand for helping direct spellcraft, and leaving lesser image recalls rippling through the air around a person to disorient them with the swirl of colors.

  I picked up my new coat, which wove in well with my magic and enforced itself against casual wear and tear as well. It left my bank account in the double digits, though I was happy to do it. Having even a little bit more protection could save me, and this bit of gear would be able to stay with me until I broke into fifth gate, which was so far away as to be essentially nonexistent, at least for now.

  Kene flew up to visit me at the bakery on one of the days, and we went on a proper date in the city, which left my account balance in the single digits, but I was happy to do so. I didn’t especially need money, after all. Food would be provided on the boat, and I could pick up a quick job or two for a bit of cash from the auxiliary watch missions.

  The Liday before the boat left, Orykson appeared. I wasn’t shocked, but I also couldn’t say I was entirely prepared for it either, as I glanced over from where I’d been sketching Foxarmor, just to speed the route to mastery.

  “Hello Orykson,” I said with a wave. “What are we working on today? I haven’t conquered the root yet.”

  “Throw yourself into a position where you’ve got to rely on it,” he said idly, scanning me. “But no, that’s not what we’re here for. You’re already working on your breakthrough in life mana, and it’s time that your death starts catching up.”

  “Oh, is it finally time?” I asked, standing and cracking my back slightly. “I had been wondering.”

  “Ah, that’s it,” Orykson said. “Well, this is interesting…”

  “What are your thoughts?” I asked.

  “The coalheart is a good treasure, but not one that’s going to completely revolutionize you. Take care to clean up any oil that comes from it, as you would excess growth when tending the rest of your mana-garden. When it comes to your new…”

  “Testudinal Basin,” I supplied. Orykson snorted.

  “When it comes to your new Testudinal Basin, I can actually shed some light there that Meadow would be unable to.”

  He held up his hand, and I felt a surge of mana, protean and strange. It wasn’t the same as mine, and I didn’t think I could make any use of it, but it was also somewhat close.

  “You’re storing soul mana, the substance that is produced by your soul, and breaks down to fill your garden with mana, power ingrained effects, and so on and so forth. It’s from the third layer of the soul, not something that you should have any degree of access to. Typically, drawing from this source is reserved for people who’ve begun to dip their toes into soul magic. There’s a fifth gate death spell that allows you to draw from this layer of the soul and forcibly restore your mana, though it strains your spirit, and a seventh gate spell that creates an artificial reserve of soul mana. Each of the seeds stimulates the soul mana in different ways – increasing density, adding in extra aspects to round out your abilities, or infusing tiny threads of it into your spells to make them more uniquely yours. I suspect that’s part of what helped shape your soul mana storage. But there are a few major differences from if you’d just taken the seed into your spirit, or if you’d somehow cast the seventh gate spell.”

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  He slipped the soul mana back into his own reserve.

  “First, Dawn’s bond has established itself. As I suspected, there is a slow but steady increase in mana density, but nothing spectacular, just a minor bonus to a person’s natural growth. Her dominion is already running through you some, and when she establishes it at third gate, I suspect you’ll see an improvement to everything a little. Her dominion seems to be ‘improvement’, ‘enhancement’, or something of the sort. More interesting is the way she’s woven starsoul, empty whispers, and ninelight through the soul reserve – the Testudinal Basin, as you call it.”

  “All three attempts at mana that imitates the deeps,” I said. “The ninelight morels were like that, and so is Dawn’s, it’s a lot like the Golden Soul. You said she burnt the drop of resolve in the tree, then wove her own starsoul power in. The tree had an actual drop of resolve, though.”

  “Had, not has. Dawn burnt it.”

  “What?”

  “She burnt it, and you should be thankful that she did. Those who bond directly to things with deep mana rarely turn out well, unless it’s a person, like Dawn or the Sun and Moon Queens. There was a man bound to an artifact called the Tongue… terrible business. Dawn burnt it to empower your legacy, which helped drag the new spell to your spatial gate, alongside Dawn.”

  “Alright. So I was left with a bucket of soul mana, streaked with power that imitates the deeps different principles.”

  “Roughly, yes. It is expanding within your – and I can’t believe I’m saying this – extra-spatial beast core. It’s capable of growth, unlike the standard Artificial Soul Mana reserve, which is set at holding a specific amount. It should make your dissection interesting.”

  I made a face.

  “Don’t just talk about dissecting me like that.”

  “Oh, but I will,” he said, a note of very dry amusement entering his voice. “Liver. Gallbladder. Hallux.”

  I threw a pencil at his head, and he smoothly caught it out of the air.

  “What about the refinement of my body?” I asked.

  “What about it?” he asked. “It’s there. Your body was already being enforced by your spirit, now it’s simply happening even more. It’s mostly based on your bones, but is now leaking out through everything.There’s not much to say. While it should be interesting to see how the Hudau Heart interacts with it, that was already true with your full-gate spells. This is simply a slightly more potent version. I suspect your restoration ability will begin to fill itself automatically while your mana and soul reserve–”

  “Testudinal Basin.”

  “Testudinal Basin,” Orykson said, rolling his eyes. “Are full, personally.”

  “Hudau Heart?”

  “The spell Edgar wants to teach you,” he said with a wave of his hand. “One of the reason his species was hunted to extinction is that their shells are hudau heritage stones, their hearts can be eaten as a natural treasure to give yourself a hudau heart spell even without having the mana for it, their spleens can be used to create a potion to permanently improve mana regeneration, their kidneys can–”

  “Okay, I get the point,” I said, shuddering. I really didn’t like the idea of innocent children – even if they were tortoises – being killed for potion ingredients.

  “They’re a magically rich species,” Orykson said. “Anything hudau is, including the hudau-crystal fox spirits.”

  I mentally marked them as a potential creature to search out, then shook my head.

  “Alright, so we’re really far off course. Dawn’s dominion is running through me, and my mana density’s improving a bit. Then I’m storing augmented soul mana in the Testudinal Basin. Anything else?”

  “The basin is nestled within your beast core tattoo, but I believe that’s the bulk of it.”

  “What do you make of Dawn’s second gate? It’s a full-gate spell,” I said.

  “I have no idea. Her spellcraft is entirely unlike anything I’ve seen before, and while Aerde and I are dissecting it as best we can, there’s a limited amount we can do. Imagine growing up only seeing the colors blue and purple, and now you’re attempting to understand something red and yellow. We utterly lack the frame of reference.”

  “Or like math,” I said. “I don’t like math. I utterly lack the frame of reference to understand it.”

  Orykson stared at me, and I grinned at him. I knew that an inane comment like that would get to him.

  “But if I was to make an educated guess, it seems to be related to spell strengthening,” Orykson said. “That’s really just a guess though, based on what I’ve examined.”

  “It’s better than I could do,” I said.

  Dawn zipped out of Dusk then, tackling into Orykson like a dog, lapping at his face. He pulled her off of him and sighed, and Dawn flew back to me. I glanced at her and stroked her head.

  “I appreciate your help,” I told her. “Where’s Dusk? I thought you two were playing with Kerbos?”

  I was sent mental flashes of Kerbos and Dusk running through the land, then Dawn feeling Orykson through my bond and wanting to say hello to the man with the masked soul and bonded spirit almost as bright as she was.

  “She says hello again,” I told Orykson. “To you and Aerde.”

  “I see,” Orykson said. “Hello Dawn. Keep an eye on your partner in Crysite, will you?”

  Dawn mentally asented, and sent a wash of Starsoul mana into Orykson, which he sucked away. He checked his pocketwatch and nodded.

  “Good. Examining the completed bond and your soul mana took about as long as I estimated. Which means it’s time for my primary purpose, as agreed upon by Meadow: It’s time to discuss your death gate. What do you know of the major branches of necromancy?”

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