Chương 64: Mini-Orbs

Arielle went on to check the number of mini-orbs in the rest of the essences in the cave. Very few of them had the same number. Some had five. Some had six. Some had twenty. Some had close to fifty. There were also a varying number of rings around each central 'core' of the orb. As she observed more closely, she realized that the core had a sort of 'pull' that caused the rings near it to shudder faster, some so fast that their movement blurred together.

Conversely, the innermost orbs were often more inactive, more or lessmaintaining a fixed position or only moving around a little bit at a time, while the ones on the outside moved faster. The number of rings orbiting each core also differed. Some had as many as ten. Others had only five rings. The rings also did not move in the same way. She wished she had the words to explain exactly what it was she was observing, but as it were, she didn't.

And then it hit her that there was one regular aspect about the organization of the mini-orbs on the rings. For example, the first Vitae orb she'd seen had ten mini orbs, but two on the inner ring and eight on the outer ring. The second Vitae orb only had one ring, but it also had eight orbs on the outer ring. So technically, they both had eight on the outer ring. The other essences replicated this similarity. Vacu seemed to always have six mini-orbs on its outer ring. Massa had seven.

Calor had two, and Luxa had one in its outer ring. Interesting. It meant something, although Arielle didn't know what it meant exactly. While the arrangement of the outer rings was pretty regular, the arrangement of the inner rings was not. Even within the same essence, one could get odd or even numbers of inner mini-orbs per ring. Some of the inner rings were even empty, and this occurred especially with the innermost orbs.

She didn't understand why that would be, as if anything, the innermost orbs would be more impacted by the strong, attractive force of the central core; given that logic, there should be more mini-orbs closer to the core than otherwise. But it was often the opposite. What was moving the essences to the outer rings? There must be a force overcoming that of the central core. Also, did the variance in the inner rings cause any difference in the action of the essences?

There was one way to know for sure, and that was by attempting to cast a spell with it. To avoid wasting her essence, Arielle first attempted to observe the orbs in her [Sensate] spell, but it was difficult to turn the spell on itself. So she ultimately had to cast a new spell, but one that was a low enough tier that she could observe it and slow it down easily. A tier one spell like [Wind Gust]. When she cast it, the first thing she noticed was that charged essences were far more agitated than the uncharged ones.

Not only did their mini-orbs move a lot more, but their central core was stronger, too. Ari went slowly, observed the movement while it came together, focusing on the rings. There was a lot of movement to observe, the orbs shaking faster the closer they got to each other. Then, once they had reached a threshold proximity, one outer shell mini-orb from each oppositely charged essence shifted from the orb, coming together in this in-between space. That was what formed the link.

One Calor and two Massa essences came together and joined. The Massa pulled the Calor shared mini-orbs closer, such that it almost seemed like Massa had eight mini-orbs in its outermost essence, too. Something interesting happened to the Calor as well. As it 'lost' its two mini-orbs in the outermost ring, the inner orbs moved around until the second outermost ring now had eight mini-orbs. So, the number was eight. That was the thing that gave essences a neutral charge.

Their activity seemed to settle down once they were in this configuration, as though happy there, even though it cost them significant energy to remain like that. She replicated the process with [Minor Illumination] and saw a similar thing with Luxa and Massa sharing the outer rings and becoming eight. That appeared to be the goal of spell-making, and it seemed to be what made the spells happiest and most comfortable; their vibrations lessened. The issue was that Vitae was happy and comfortable on its own.

It didn't need to be combined with other essences to have a full outer ring. So why was it able to participate in spells in the first place? Arielle dispersed the spell, and this time she paid attention to the process of termination. The mini-orbs shared by the essences on the outermost ring were the ones that held the bond in place. When the bonds separated, the mini-orbs snapped back to their respective owners and were less active, slower, and more dim, same withthe rest of the mini-orbs and the central core.

However, one of the shared mini-orbs had actually stopped moving, and it shifted to the inner rings while a more excitable one took its place in the outer ring. The exchange was interesting to watch, and the shared mini-orb didn't stop there. It kept jumping to the inner rings, closer and closer to the central core until it was in the innermost ring. Then, it moved closer, just a bit, as the central core expanded and... Well, it ate it. Arielle frowned. What was that about?

Were the essences eating themselves after every spell? No, because it hadn't occurred to the other orbs, just this one. But if it happened once, it could probably happen again. And again. And again. Why had it happened, though? And what happened when the essence had eaten all its mini-orbs? Did the essence just disappear and cease to exist? Did it die? The thought made Arielle uneasy. Was casting spells leading the essences to an eventual death? If the answer was 'yes', what would she do? Stop casting spells?

Arielle thought about it, and it tied back into her feelings on death and killing things. Every mortal thing dies. That was a given. Arielle knew that things had to die for her to be alive. Meat was a staple in her home, and animals died to provide that sustenance. Her mother had explained that to her when she was younger and found her father slaughtering a boar. She had thought Ari would be traumatized, but to be honest, Arielle had never considered it.

The thought of things dying had never bothered her before, at least not when they were killed to protect their village or enable them to live. If it had bothered her, she would have stopped eating it. There was one person in her village who did that, and only ate grains and vegetables, and they had been thin and sickly their entire life. Meat was required to be strong in the swamp, and their strength was important for their survival.

So things with meat had to be killed, and it couldn't be other humans because, as Brom put it, "That's disgusting." Arielle knew it wasn't the concept of death that bothered her, This novel is published on a different platform. Support the original author by finding the official source. It was more so partaking in a wasteful death. The troll's death had bothered her because it didn't have to die. If Arielle had known more spells and had better communication skills, the troll might have lived.

Then again, there might have been nothing she could do, the same way there was likely nothing Brom could have done except kill the bogworm. But she hadn't even tried. That was what bothered her. Things should die for a good reason, not for a bad reason. Applying that to the concept of essences, which she considered her friends and closer to her than trolls or bogworms or boars... what if her actions were causing them to die? Were they dying for a good reason?

Were spells required to keep people alive and keep them safe? Well, yes. Without her spells, she probably wouldn't have been able to protect people from the troll, and more people would have died. What was more important, her spirit friends or human strangers? That was difficult to answer, and she pondered it for some time. It would probably be the orbs. They would take precedence over the human strangers.

"I'm sorry," she told the orb that had just swallowed its mini orb. It still buzzed the same as others, just a little tiredly. She used her combo to search the cave for any other orb like that and soon encountered something interesting. There was one orb with zero moving mini-orbs. It wasn't dead, but it did move a little sadly. It was sad that it could not partake in spells anymore. That must be one of the orbs that can't be reused.

They didn't have any moving particles in their outermost shell, and all the orbs in their innermost shell had been eaten. She understood that as the limit. When an orb no longer had anything moving in its outer shells, or at least anything to support its charge, then it could not be reused. So if mini-orbs no longer moved, they would get ingested, and if enough mini-orbs were ingested, the orb would not die... but it would live a less happy life. That was something to think about. But what was the alternative?

To not cast spells? That would make the orbs miserable, too, because it was what they lived for. They enjoyed being bonded even for those brief moments. It was better to live a life with little moments of enjoyment that eventually came to an end than to live one with none, just for the sake of living. Perhaps this was just a natural death for them, although she would still have to remember not to waste her spells and edge them closer to the end for no reason. But what caused the outer orb to stop moving?

Why did the orb ingest it? That was a question for another day. She continued on her investigation, pushing the orb's tiredness to the back of her mind to contemplate later. The next thing she did was activate a spell with Vitae. She didn't do this directly because most Vitae spells were tier 3 and above, which might be more complicated to observe.

Also, given how long [Sensate] and Orion had been active for, this system might recognize an additional high-adept spell as a master-tier effort, though she doubted this would happen. Nevertheless, she cheated by activating a vitality charm and observing the connections there. Vitae did not form a bond the same way the others did. First off, its external shell was the least active of all the essences, even after being charged, to the point where some of the mini-orbs resisted being pulled into the in-between space.

Vitae never reached out to anyone. The two other orbs, Massa and Calor, reached out to Vitae, and Vitae was only affected because they were working jointly, Massa pulling and Calor pushing. It caused Vitae's central core to reduce its pull, and the outermost mini-orbs to become more active. The Massa-Calor combo eventually aggravated Vitae into shifting one of their outermost orbs outwards into the in-between space to allow for the bonding to happen because now there were fewer than eight outermost orbs.

All this took longer and was more effort than the other spells. That must be part of the reason why Vitae was harder to use for those who didn't have the dedicated core expertise thatLyra did. It was also likely why the staff was so interested in Lyra. Lyra's problem was that whatever her aunt had done to her had exacerbated Vitae's antisociality.

Arielle would have to investigate to know for sure, but they probably did something to link Vitae's central core to Lyra's inner core, treating it like she was also another of its mini-orbs. In addition to that, it also affected her energy lines to prevent her from holding onto any essences. So to solve that, Arielle had to do one of two things: Remove the Vitae link Lyra had. This was the least attractive of the options.

Not only might it affect Lyra's vitae cores and reduce her potential command of the essence, but it might also be the hardest thing to do, requiring knowledge of anatomy that Arielle didn't have. Although Wulfric, Lord Wesley's son, might have it, since he was interested in matters of the heart. However, she'd rather not go down that path right now. Perhaps later she would consider it. The second option was to weaken Vitae's core so that it had less hold of the outer shells.

Alternatively, she could alsosimply agitate the outer mini-orbs, so that they would move as they had done in the spell. Or she could do both. Either one would work for her purposes, but she didn't yet know how to do them. She could experiment with different vitae spells and see what made some easier to cast than others. However, she had a theory already working in her mind. The easier spells had lots of Vacu and Calor near the central Vitae orb.

Their incredibly polar charges probably caused more agitation to the outer mini-orbs and made them more likely to move into the in-between space, at least temporarily. Ironically, the spells that came together more easily (with more energy in the outer mini-orbs) were also more complex and contained more other essences for this very reason, because more Calor and Vacu increased the energy of the spell, and that made Vitae more agitated and more likely to shift.

That was also another reason why Vitae spells tended to be higher-tier, and Lyra was left struggling with the lower-tier spells. She would probably do better with higher-tier Vitae spells if she didn't have her specific problem and had well-trained Calor and Vacu cores. Of course, she couldn't exactly manage the energy and focus requirements of the higher-tier spells with her current condition.

Unless Ari made her a handy rune she could use, one that suppressed the inner core of Vitae and excited the outer mini-orbs. This was exactly what runes were made for: to enable one to use higher-tier spells with less activation energy. Once this was done, Lyra would aim to use stronger spells, which would be easier for her. She might get a [Hidden Ability] marker with it, but that was fine. It wasn't like she needed to hide her skills. This would be a great temporary solution.

There was the part where she would lose her other cores on her sixteenth birthday, but Ari could figure that out later, after she did a deep analysis of Lyra's cores. One problem at a time. For now, she celebrated her small win in discovering more about Vitae and essences in general. This opened up a world of possibilities for her, especially with rune-making. She might even be able to create a rune that made Vitae-only spells possible, so that Lyra could still be a mage even after losing her other cores.

She could be the first warrior Priestess. How cool. Ari didn't get much time to analyze the blue orb because Rava came back almost immediately after her discovery, and they had to go back to campus. Once she got to her room, she pulled out her rune manual, but she remembered belatedly that she'd sent a message to Elric earlier. She opened up the scroll, and it showed several messages from her family first. Brom: I broke the news to everyone. They're not as thrilled as I hoped they would be.

Mother: Arielle, this is your mother. Your brother's explanation is an obvious lie, but he refuses to tell me the truth, so I demand that you tell me right now. Where is the coin from? It's an obscene amount of coin. Your father nearly had a heart attack after seeing it. Arielle, are you involved in something clandestine? Father: Arielle, this is your father. I did not nearly have a heart attack at the sight of the gold, but your mother screeched so loud she nearly burst my eardrums. Now she's nagging everyone.

Please take pity on us all and explain to her how we are now the wealthiest family in our village and in all the nearby towns. Celie: Arielle, this is Celie. Tell me if that Wizard has you doing dirty work. If so, I'm going to murder him in his sleep. Arielle sighed. She felt the conversation with her family would be too overwhelming and stressful, and would probably involve some lying. Best to avoid it for now.

Maybe if she avoided it long enough, everyone would forget about it and move on and enjoy their newfound wealth. And Celie might forget about her plan to kill Elric once she received her birthday present that Brom had arranged. It would work itself out. She turned the page to note that Elric had read her message and responded already. Elric: I looked into the names you gave me. One of those people, Lionel Reeves, was not a Vacu-dominant. He was Massa-Luxa.

Ari: He doesn't have to be a Vacu-dominant to use Vacu-dominant spells. Elric: True, but it's strange that he's the only one who's not. Another one that's interesting is Cornelius Draco. He's from Hama, a town I'll be visiting soon. While there, I'll ask around about him, see if we can find anything useful. Ari: Okay. Why are you visiting Hama? Elric: It's the capital of Nerik, where the demonic sect convenes, and their elders reside.

I got a lead from someone who used to be a commander a long time ago, and she told me that the situation in Khor has happened before, during her time serving in the forces. Someone, a cult, caused a dimensional rift that had demons pouring into our realm. The mages were able to take care of it, but when they caught the culprits, most were already dead. One of them was alive, caught by the demonic sect, who were to interrogate him before he met the council. However, he died in their custody. Typical. Arielle: I see.

Elric: Yes. I'm going to investigate more about him and talk to the sect elders. That should be a lot of fun. Arielle: I'm glad you'll have fun. Elric: I won't. That last part was sarcastic. Arielle: Oh. Elric: She wants to meet you, by the way. The commander. Arielle: Why? Elric: Because of reasons I will explain later. I should go back to work now. Arielle: Okay. I will talk to you later. Just in time, Arielle got a knock on her door.

When she opened the door, it was to find Maus with his fist raised, about to knock again, with Lyra beside him.

"Good, you're here," Arielle said.

"Let's get to work."