(A/N: You guys are something else. Let me tell when I saw how many powerstones we were at, I simply could not believe my eyes. You all really went out of your way to pry my gaming from my hands. Still I enjoyed the extra writing time so I guess I can't complain plus this still fits into Sellen week so I guess its a good thing. Enjoy what the powerstones have brought us.)
XOXO
Onyx poked at Sellen's cheek.
"Ughh." She shifted away with a groan, a dark blue eye cracking open to peek out from her dark mess of hair. "Apprentice?" With another groan she waved away his hand and turned, pulling herself fully into the bedroll she spent the night in. "Leave me be. We can start your lessons later."
Soon enough all he could make out of her was her frazzled dark hair.
He chuckled. She'd been quite restless on their way back to the island, but now that she was adjusting to her freedom and they were in relative safety, it looked like she wasn't much of a morning person.
"We're going to need to use the fire soon. You're going to have to find somewhere else to sleep in if you don't want everyone walking over you." Onyx warned.
Sellen groaned once more, her voice muffled. "Move me then. Just please, make sure its somewhere quiet."
Quiet wasn't the easiest ask considering that, unlike her, the rest of them were already up and about for the day, but he didn't mind indulging the request. Scooping her and the roll she was tucked in up, Onyx headed into his cabin and dropping her off inside before leaving and making his way towards the ruins, the golden dagger Kenneth handed over grabbed on his way out.
Faint strums lulled him around to its side.
With their morning run already completed, Edgar was beginning some more physical training, in the middle of some push ups. He wasn't alone. Just as he joined them on their run for a change, Boc was a small distance away from Edgar, following in his example.
Or at least trying.
Whereas Edgar hadn't even begun to break a sweat, spread out arms perfect steady as he raised and lowered himself at a controlled pace, Boc's shaky arms struggled to support himself through a handful of the motions, sweat already beginning to gather along his fur lined face.
Just how far did Boc intend to go? Onyx was looking forward to seeing the answer unravel through his efforts.
Irina sat on the stump of a chopped down tree, testing some of the tunes he'd shown her as well as attempting her own. He'd only just introduced the instruments to them before setting out last time, but she'd really taken to the new experience. Her lack of sight, ironically enough, actually played a small role in her quick advancement.
Most beginners, especially with things like guitars, tended to overwhelm themselves by keeping a constant eye on their hands. Not strange and even helpful for someone completely new, but building muscle memory and becoming fully acquainted with the entire instrument through touch alone always helped to bring things to the next level. Naturally, she'd skipped straight to that, her familiarity with all its parts showing in the faint tunes she strummed.
Rather than joining them or interrupting Irina's playing, Onyx left the church and cabins behind, passing through trees, bushes, and small wildlife scattering throughout it all. The dirt beneath his boots turned to crunching sand as he reached the shore.
His mana enhanced body and its quick development didn't need much action on his part to maintain but if he wanted to keep pushing it that demanded more strenuous exercises and if he wanted to get tangible results out of training with others, partners that could keep pace.
In the strength department no one on the island could be a match there, but that didn't mean no one could push him.
Melina, patrolling along the coastline as she tended to do, stopped as she came upon him, head tilting.
"Cyclops." He said, dagger raised up. "What do you say to a little sparring?"
Her head straightened back up after a moment's pause, hands slowly emerging from her cloak, her own dagger at the ready.
XOXO
Breath held and arm steady, Onyx brought his golden dagger to the turquoise gem of the golden necklace he held. With slow deliberate pulls, pushes, and changes of directions, he began to etch into the gem, his mana beginning to flow down his arm but not leaving it quite yet.
On one hand, pushing this body to gain the strength he knew himself to be capable of at his best was a constant struggle, but slow delicate work like this came with its own trouble.
Too much force and the gem would be damaged. Too little and his etchings wouldn't take effect. Use any more than the absolute tip of the dagger and that would also render all of his effort useless in the best case scenario. It was rare, so rare that the few practiced in what he was doing wouldn't consider it an actual threat, but he could end up creating something with completely unintended effects that ranged from harmless to permanently debilitating.
With a steady hand and slowly deflating lungs he kept at it, gradually turning the gem until the base that the gold chain entwined with was completely covered in his etches. Only then did he press a finger to it, his mana changing to match the miniscule energy that rested within the gem before surging forth.
The etching took on a dark blue glow, the rest of the gem releasing a turquoise pulse of light, before both settled down.
He released a breath, his stomach dropping in time with his already replenishing mana reserves. This was just as draining as he expected.
Either way, he was left with the golden necklace, its turquoise gem releasing the faintest of light only visible due to the darkness of the cabin.
A yawn filled the air, Sellen rising up from the floor between his and Melina's bed. She tiredly glanced around, eventually locking eyes with him. Then her gaze fell to the necklace. All grogginess vanished, Sellen on feet in a flash and leaning over his bed to get a better look at it.
His gaze was drawn to the swell of her breasts, the undone buttons of her shirt providing a slight view of their top.
He'd admit, even as she was now, dark long hair a tangled up mess, wrinkled up shirt half tucked into her skirt while the other half's end fell free, Sellen was attractive. The face that been hidden beneath rock and glintstone was sharp in shape with relatively soft features, her vibrant yet in a way dark blue eyes fitting for her. The modest clothes Irina lent her didn't bring much attention besides the unbuttoning she'd done herself, but they revealed that those robes of hers had been hiding her figure entirely.
"I recall seeing you toy with such things back in the study." Sellen said. If she picked up on his wandering eyes, they were ignored in favor of examining the necklace. "However, I don't recall any such glow or writing on them. Strange, I don't recognize the text either. You're responsible for them, are you not apprentice? What language is that?"
"Language, huh?" He shifted the jewelry, holding the gem directly in front of her so she could get a better look at it. "They're more like words and phrases than a language."
"I assume they serve a purpose."
Rather than explaining any further, he pulled his away from her face and twirled it, the golden chain wrapping around the palm of his left hand. At the same time, he raised his dagger, pressed it to the back of that arm and dragged the blade across it. A shallow cut was left behind that dripped a few droplets of blood onto the fur of his bed below.
Droplets that soon came to an end, the bleeding staunched. It took well over a minute for the shallow cut to close but once it did, a wipe of the spilled blood did away with any evidence there had ever been an injury there to begin with.
"You're capable of imbuing objects with power?" Sellen questioned, eyes noticeably wider. "And without the use of any glintstone or any of the Order's teachings? Can I-"
He pulled the necklace away from her with a shake of his head. "I'll be giving this to Irina once I finish up with it. You'll have to ask her later on if you want to study it."
"I see." Sellen begrudgingly restrained her curiosity and rose to her full height, stretching out, her languid bend reminiscent of a cat. "I slept the morning away, didn't I?" He nodded. "I suppose I best get to work." She headed for the door, wincing as she opened it and light poured in. "I do hope you'll share a bit about those inscriptions with me when you have the time."
Onyx hummed as she left, door closed behind her.
Enchanting, runecrafting, even smithing. It took on many different names and fell into different categories depending on where he was, but it always remained an inherently difficult thing for most to grasp. There was no chance that Sellen would be able to grasp the meaning behind these specific words, each one older than himself, but that didn't mean she couldn't learn the practice and far surpass what he was capable of.
An inquisitive mind like hers predisposed her for it.
XOXO
"Apprentice?" A faint call roused Onyx from his sleep.
Strands of blond hair greeted him when he opened his eyes, Irina's back pressed to his chest and his chin above her head. She was sound asleep, the golden necklace he'd gifted her shifting with her steady breaths.
"Are you awake?" Sellen's low and muffled voice came from the door.
Carefully shifting, he extracted himself from Irina, rising up from the bed. He wasn't the only one woken by the call, Melina, the light sleeper that she was, already sitting up. She stayed in her bed while he headed over to the door. Sellen was on the other side, arms crossed with one hand cupping her chin, clearly lost in thought beneath the nightly glow of the moon and Erdtree.
"Ah, apprentice." She lowered her hand, greeting him with a nod. "My apologies for any interruption but I finished up repairs on one of the marionettes and there is something strange about it." She said. "Truthfully, there are a few strange happenings that I would like to pick your brain about."
Compared to when she first woke up, she'd cleaned up, clothes straightened and long hair pulled into a hastily done ponytail that while messy did its job, all but a few lose strands allowed to block her vision.
Rather than wasting any time with clarifications, he took a moment to pull on the boots he kept beside the door and followed her out, Melina returning to her rest after a departing nod from him.
Sellen led the way up to the ruins that housed the dragon's corpse, around its side and to its rear. She didn't slow her pace until they passed several trees and reached the point just before a downward slope began to take shape. Among the trees were both the marionettes, one on the ground, and the other active, standing directly across from them.
The energy that powered it was noticeably stronger than it had been when he took it down at the ruins that Sellen had been imprisoned.
"The tree, attack it." Sellen ordered, pointing out one beside the active marionette. True to its nature as a life sized puppet, it followed the order without question, arms raised as it approached its designated target. No stutter or jitteriness plagued its movement, a curled fist shooting forth and splintering the tree's bark. It left quite the indent. The sort it wouldn't have been able to with the level of strength he'd gone against. "Return to your position." Sellen ordered before it could send forth the others it was prepping with its three other hands.
"That strength is unusual, but it isn't the only oddity." Sellen stated, undoing a strap of leather she was using to keep her staff holstered to her hip and taking aim. The spherical glintstone lit up and with a wave she fired a simple glintstone pebble at one of its legs.
The color of the light trailing around the stone wasn't the perfect shade of her staff's sphere, instead bearing a darkened tint not far off from any he fired. Not only that but the pebble possessed both power and speed, digging deep into the marionette's unprotected leg before vanishing.
The marionette dropped to a knee.
Then rose, a similarly colored glow of light forming within the hole in its leg and fixing the damage.
All things his mana would allow.
"The repairs I did were simple enough but fully reactivating it and adjusting the, let's say parameters, which determine who it considers invaders required that I use my energy as a catalyst for the process." Sellen explained. "While I would like to say that I'm such a powerful sorcerer that any marionette would be strengthened by coming into contact with my energy that certainly wasn't the case before my imprisonment." A bit of her usual mirth slipped into her tone, Sellen more curious than concerned by the changes. "A few basic experiments have revealed that all my sorceries are far more efficient as well, demanding less energy on my part yet more powerful than they should be. I assume this has to do with how you freed me?"
"Yep." He confirmed the assumption. "There's still plenty of my power in you. You're making use of it in all your sorceries."
"Hmmm, and is this permanent?"
"No. Either you'll use it all up or it'll dissipate with time." The answer would be different if she had mana pathways of her own but as it were, without any perpetual circulation to keep in going, the energy couldn't be maintained by her body as it flowed out of her soul.
"Interesting." As usual whenever she fell into deep thought, Sellen cupped her chin, considering the information. "Tell me, apprentice, if I requested more of this energy of yours when that happens would you be willing to give it to me?"
An expected question. Power wasn't something most people would be willing to just let go of after all. Though in Sellen's case, the twinkle of curiosity in her eyes told him that power wasn't her only reasoning.
"You do realize that'll mean constantly exposing your essence to me, don't you?"
"Of course. While I admit, I'm not looking forward to that pain again, I have no issue with it. If I haven't already made this clear, there is no one I trust, or can trust, to the extent that I do you. You, both literally and preverbally, had my fate in the palm of your own and by the looks of it did nothing other than empower me." Sellen pulled back slightly, a teasing look of judgment crossing her face. "Don't tell me…Is there some cretinous side to yourself that you've been working so hard to keep hidden?"
Onyx snorted. He couldn't imagine being so lax about putting his soul into another's hand. Not that he could imagine any circumstances in which he'd do something like that in the first place.
"Worry not my dear apprentice. Even if you reveal yourself to be a degenerate there will be no judgment from me."
"Yeah, yeah, whatever you say." He said with a shake of his head. This wouldn't be the first time he gave mana to another, but the method was untested ground for him. Shared mana itself should be harmless but touching another's soul wasn't something he made a habit of. "I have no idea if there will be any side effects."
"Ah, so you don't go around laying hands on the most precious part of every woman? I suppose you aren't a degenerate." Sellen allowed herself one last chuckle before her tone and expression took a turn for the serious. "Then we shall consider this our first experiment as teacher and student. Let's do try our best to learn something from this."
He nodded along before looking around.
The spot she'd chosen was close enough to the rest of them that any troubled shouts and yells could be heard but just far enough away that it provided the quiet she'd likely been after to work on the marionettes as well as the peace to experiment.
"I'll start on building a workshop for us here later on." Onyx said. Once he had enough mana to manage more complicated inscriptions on applicable equipment, a dedicated space would become a necessity. Sellen would get the most use out of it for now, but this was a good chance to get it ready ahead of time.
It wasn't a building he wanted to use wood for though.
"Hmmm?" Sellen hummed, already kneeling before the other marionette and reaching into its damaged insides. "You do that, apprentice. I'll finish up here." In other words, she'd be up all night. It'd taken her hours just to get the first ready, which meant the second wouldn't be on its feet until the morning at the earliest.
There was something ironic about Sellen, who needed sleep, to be the one forgoing it while he and Melina enjoyed their rest.
He took off, leaving her to it.
First there was Melina. Then the, as of late, unusually quiet goddess of these lands. And now, Sellen.
Beyond beings trying to consume, bind, or kill him, his lives didn't typically have so much direct interaction with the soul going on. His or otherwise.
XOXO
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