The "star" was no longer just an image.
He could feel it now, in the same way he felt his heart or lungs.
A physical presence, a knot of impossible mass threaded into the web of his astral veins.
Each new pass of Ki into it didn't just increase its weight — it began to hum.
A low, deep vibration that resonated through his skull, like the bass note of a war drum.
The hum built. The motes of light in his inner vision swirled into spirals.
The next cycle hit the node with a rush of Ki that didn't just absorb — it ignited.
The neutron star flared, its gravity folding inward until the whole thing seemed to compress into a single pinpoint of light.
Then it burst — not outward, but inward, collapsing into a perfect, stable core.
The hum became a steady thrum, and the strain of holding it vanished.
The star was anchored now, woven directly into the structure of the astral veins.
[Congratulations! You have formed your first node!]
