The Spirit Domain was a calm, silent place, a vast, swirling backdrop of cosmic energy. It was a universe of his own making, and in it, time had less meaning than in the outside world.
Elias stood on the rippling surface of his energy, the liquid-like substance shimmering with the gentle flow of his Flow and the dark, deep current of his Anti-Flow swirling into each other to form the symbol of Infinity and above him clouds of cosmic dust on secured his Trait Sygil. The four artifacts he had manifested hovered around him, silent and expectant, their auras distinct and potent.
"Alright," Elias said, his voice echoing softly in the void.
"Let's start with the easy one."
He reached out and with a thought, pulled the folded Talisman towards him. It was a simple rectangular piece of paper, yet it radiated an immense amount of energy that pulsed from the scribblings on it like electricity through a circuit. He activated his Flow Perception, and the essence of the paper appeared before his eyes as a glowing, intricate script. The lines of energy were not interwoven like a complex machine, a common characteristic of the Artifacts . Instead, it was a single, powerful, and binding sequence around the center array which was the symbol of a four pointed star meaning this Talisman has properties of a Soulfire type artifact.
" If I recall,this is the same Talisman he used to summon that snake Shikigami right?" Elias wondered as he activated the Array. At once the Shikigami manifested and began to hover around them. Eli raised his hand to touch it,a look of fascination on his face.
"What is this?" Eli asked, his eyes wide.
"It's a Shikigami. You may not know this but back on my earth, Shikigami were mystical beings or spirits in Japanese folklore, often depicted as a paper puppet or talisman imbued with spiritual power. Similar to the Chinese concept of paper men or spirit money, Shikigami are believed to serve their creators, typically Onmyodo practitioners, by carrying out tasks or providing protection. In both Japanese and Chinese cultures, such spiritual entities are often associated with rituals, magic, and the supernatural. While I don't think it's a the same concept being used here it is interesting to see Arrays being used to influence energy to produce something similar." Elias said, his voice filled with a scholarly tone only a bookworm would have when asked about an area they knew much aboy.
" I don't really know what you mean but it looks cool."
Elias glared at him for not appreciating what he had said and just sighed,calling back the snake back into the form of the Talisman.
"Now that I look at it,it's different from how artifacts function.It's not a blueprint for what functions characteristics should perform. It's a cage."
" How so?" Eli asked.
He held up his hand and the array expanded, a glowing, ephemeral blueprint. "See?" Elias explained.
"A regular Artifact is like a machine. The arrays are the blueprints, the instructions to what is already there: the characteristics, the residual essence found in the Artifacts materials. This however is different. The arrays on this Talisman are designed to create effects,capture and contain a totally new effect then release it when commanded. Lyle's Talisman wasn't a blueprint for an explosion. It was a cage for one."
Eli stared at the blueprint, his mind processing the information.
"So, it's like a battery?" he asked.
"You charge it with an effect, and you can use it later?"
"Not a battery," Elias said, shaking his head. "A battery stores energy. This stores an effect. It's more like a grenade.You could say a grenade creates and stores the effect of an explosion. Once you activate that effect by pulling the pin, it releases the effect explodes."
Eli stared at him silently.
" What's a grenade?"
Elias stared back.
" Of course,my bad."
He looked at the Talisman floating Infront of them,it's internal arrays expanded around them like circuitry. He opened his palm and balled it into a fist causing the expanded projection to shrink back to into it.
" If the Talisman simultaneously created and and stored effects until activated,then what was that snake Shikigami actually? Because it had the symbol for Soulfire which all artifacts centered around that class uses as a basis array to hold the various layers of instructions together?"
" Does that mean Lyle created an artificial Soul?" Eli asked.
" Hmm,that shouldn't be possible. Ok actually....." Elias began to mutter to himself.
" Um,hello I'm here too,speak so I can also understand."
" Well,I think it would be possible to temporarily create a Flow Construct and not an actual soul. Like how I created you."
" Oh,I see." Eli said nodding.
" The only other explanation I have is that he has a Trait from the Soulfire Class which deals with Spirituality and Souls." Elias said with a shrug.
" But that would mean he's quite high up on the ladder right?" Eli pointed out.
The image of Lyle with a protruding stomach after eating too much and unable to get off a chair came to mind.
" I can still eat more." Imaginary Luke said with a burp.
Both Eli and Elias looked at each other.
" Naaah." They said in unison.
"But anyway ,I think I know what we're going to do," Elias said, a glint in his eye.
"We're going to create our own Talismans. We're going to use this method to hone my Flow Constructs."
Eli's eyes widened.
"That sounds like a great idea. Where do we start?"
"We'll start with the basics," Elias said.
"We'll try to recreate the explosion Talisman. It'll be a good way to master Containment and Transmutation Arrays. I think I'll base it on how grenade's work and use that to teach you what a grenade is."
" Ok."
"Once we've done that, we'll move on to something more complex."
He closed his eyes and began to theorise, his thoughts racing at an incredible speed as he remembered on of his favourite shows from his previous life.
"The next step will be a SubstitutionTalisman. A simple teleportation technique."
" So a sort of 'teleportation ticket?'" Eli asked.
" No,not quite."
"Ok. And then?" Eli asked.
"Then," Elias said, a faint smile on his face, "we'll get to the real work. The energy-affecting Talisman. One that could, in theory, affect Flow itself."
Eli was silent for a moment, and a dark look passed over his face.
"This is all about gaining power, isn't it?" he asked, his voice low and serious though the edges of his lips began to twitch.
Elias's focus on the Talismans wavered. "What are you talking about?"
"You have not found a way to go around your immortality yet," Eli said, his eyes fixed on him a slow smile creeping on his face.
" You haven't even attempted to research any self-destructive techniques, have you? Don't you think we're wasting time?"
Elias looked away.
"I… I don't know enough yet," he mumbled. "I can't just stumble into a solution. The first step is to learn as much as I can about energy."
"Is it though?" Eli asked, his voice filled with a subtle, dark undertone.
"Or is it just an excuse? A way to put off the inevitable?"
Elias said nothing. He had no answer.
The silence hung between them, a tangible, suffocating weight. After a while he spoke.
" Just like you can't do anything with knowing about it first I can't kill myself with knowing the various intricacies of my now endless life. What if my attempt just puts me in a more precarious situation all for the amusement for that off-white bastard?"
The void in the Spirit Domain seemed to grow darker, and more sinister.
Eli's expression softened, and the dark look on his face disappeared as quickly as it had appeared. He was back to his usual cheerful self.
"Right," he said, clapping his hands together.
"Let's focus on the task at hand. We'll worry about that later."
Elias let out a long, shaky breath.
"Yeah," he said, his voice a little strained.
"Later."
"Right," he said, his voice firm. "Let's move on to the next one."