Side Story: Mora and Delair

“Alright, I need to do a bit of work at the grove so if I leave the two of you alone for a bit, can you both be on your best behaviour?” Fontesh asked, her attention mainly focused on her daughter when it came to them both, with Mora already having enough trust, leaving Delair to roll her eyes.

“We’ll be fine, Mom. We’re the picture of responsibility. Isn’t that right, Mora?”

“I’ll make sure she doesn’t take anything apart while you’re gone,” Mora told her confidently, earning a smile from Fontesh and a glare from Delair.

“It was only one time and you helped too!”

“But it was your idea and you didn’t tell me we weren’t allowed.”

“It doesn’t matter, we put it back together so it’s fine and we’ll be fine.”

“Mmh, well, if you do end up having any troubles, just go grab Grandma, alright? I’ll be back in a couple of hours to get lunch started for all of us.”

With the day just started, there was going to be plenty of time to kill and as Fontesh walked off, Mora couldn’t help but wonder just what Delair was going to try to drag him into. It wasn’t like he didn’t enjoy it, he had fun spending time with her, but it felt like there was always an idea going through her head.

And with the other kids looking like they’ve started their own magic practice early, I guess that means it’s just the two of us for now. He thought, seeing as her face took on a mischievous grin the second her mother got far enough away, leaving the girl to spread out her arms in front of him.

“What?”

“Come on, you know what I wanna do.”

“Hug?”

“No, not that.”

“Oh.”

He deflated as he said it. As far as mortal inventions went, he was comfortable saying that hugging was one of the better ones. While not something either the great life or death spirits had exposed him to in his time with them, Thera and Ben had made it clear it was a shortcut to showing one that they cared that he’d grown quite fond of, all of the more so after he’d begun using a mortal body himself. The experience lit up his sense of touch in a way that, even if he wasn’t one to ask for it, he found he always enjoyed, with his disappointment making itself clear enough to the girl before him.

“Oh, alright, here,” Delair said, laughing as she gave in and watched him brighten for it. “I’m used to spoiling the younger kids in the village, anyway.”

“I’m not that much younger.”

“You’re a few months old.”

“Okay, but mentally we’re around the same.”

That was what most based his development off of after all, even if Delair didn’t think it counted.

“Mentally doesn’t mean anything. I’ve got years of knowledge ahead of you, so as your senior, you’ve gotta trust me. I have a super-duper fun idea for how we can pass the time.”

“Mmh, alright, let’s hear it.”

He wasn’t sure he trusted her logic, but there was no denying that she was better at figuring out things to do. At the very least, it was never dull and with that bit of acceptance given, she stretched out her arms again, sounding excited as she spoke.

“Run with me.”

“Like, race? Okay, I guess, but I think you already know you’re going to lose.”

“Yeah, of course I would, which is why that’s not what I’m talking about. Pick me up and run as fast as you can! I didn’t get to enjoy it last time because, well…”

She faltered there, not sure how to bring it up delicately and left Mora to finish for her.

“Because last time was when I was running from the insane great spirit I’d created and all of the damage to the town it was doing?”

“Let’s not focus on that,” she hurried to tell him. “It’s just, thinking back on it, that seems like it would be way more fun without everyone panicking around us.”

He wasn’t sure if it would be more fun for himself, given that by the sounds of it, he’d be doing all of the work, but he supposed he could do it for just a little bit to entertain her. She was his friend, admittedly his only friend, but much like with Thera and Ben, he enjoyed trying to make her happy. Doing that for just a bit before moving on to anything else wouldn’t be too bad.

“Fine,” he gave in, getting to see the happy look on her face for his acceptance. “But I can’t promise I’ll be as fast as last time. I wasn’t using a mortal body then, I don’t know how it’s going to change things.”

“Then that means this counts as testing and it’s even better,” Delair told him, her lessons on the value of proper experimentation thoroughly ingrained. “Come on, let’s see how fast you can go!”

She was jumping at him as soon as she said it, forcing Mora to catch her, even as Mora acknowledged it probably wouldn't be that bad. There were both physical and intangible aspects to attributes and as a spirit, his would normally be entirely the latter. He believed he’d gotten the hang of applying them to a living body by that point and considering that the homunculus he worked through possessed physical strength, that meant in principle, he might have been a bit stronger and faster by combining it with his natural power, even if it didn’t feel like it.

But all of that was in theory, not what he experienced when he tried to apply it to the physical world. As he began to run, he picked up speed, not able to move as instantaneously as his true spirit form would allow and while he was able to go faster and faster with each step, he could feel he wasn’t reaching his fullest potential either. He was able to move as if he had tens of thousands of points in his agility but that still fell significantly short of what a spirit could do if they weren’t handicapping themselves with flesh.

It’s like there’s still a little disconnect between myself and my new body. He examined as he went, not letting himself be distracted by the sounds of Delair’s excited cheers as they ran laps through the village. I wonder if it’s something I’ll be able to overcome or if it’s just a side effect of this I’m going to have to live with for as long as I’m in here?

As far as side-effects went, it wasn’t exactly like it was the worst either. If he could display attributes in the tens of thousands, then he was already well beyond the vast majority of the planet and doing too much could always have drawbacks too. He was the mana that made him up, every other attribute he held depended on it, and if he were to ever burn it all away then he’d burn away with it. If his new body was acting as a guardrail that kept him from spending beyond his regeneration rate then it was easy enough to view it as a safety feature instead of some unfortunate drawback, there to keep him from being too careless with the power that he was.

“So, how long are you gonna want to do this for?” he asked as he ran, feeling the wind slap against his face as he went.

“Just one more lap, then we can do something else, okay?”

“Fine.”

One more lap was nothing and he let himself enjoy it as he went, taking in the village for all it had before looping back to Fontesh’s home when disaster struck. Before he could slow down, Mora kicked a stone that had been sitting on the road, sending pain shooting through his toe.

He felt bile crawl up his throat as he came to the quickest stop he could, gingerly setting Delair down before curling up in a ball on the ground to nurse his foot and groan.

“Um, Mora?” Delair said, gently shaking his shoulder. “We have a problem.”

“The problem is I’m never going to recover from this,” he groaned out. “I think I’m traumatized.”

“It’s a stubbed toe.”

“It’s a pain like I’ve never gone through before. I think I might be sick.”

“Okay, if you made yourself that body then you can fix it. We’ve got a bigger problem.”

Ugh, I guess I probably can fix it, can’t I?

Not to the extent of a pure life spirit, but Delair was right. He’d made the body he inhabited, he could at least repair it to that extent and with that pointed out he began the healing process, erasing his pain and clearing his mind enough that the sick feeling that had come with it faded, letting himself sit back up and take a deep breath.

“Okay, I’m better. So what’s the problem?”

“The problem’s that Mom’s gonna kill us.”

She grabbed Mora’s head as she said it and aimed it towards her house, letting him see the damage he’d wrought. While the effect of the stone on his delicate toes had felt extreme enough, the pain had also shielded him from realizing the obvious implication as to what else had happened. While running with attributes in the tens of thousands, he’d kicked a stone and shot it forward, with all of the energy he’d accidentally put into it being converted into destructive power.

While thankfully the house itself still stood, the front door had been reduced to splinters. There wasn’t even anything left of it that could be patched up, leaving the entryway empty and distracting him enough that he didn’t immediately notice the sounds of other footsteps running towards them.

“Alright, what happened?” Hentath called out when she got the two in her view. “I heard a bang loud enough to wake me from my nap and… ah.”

She’d caught sight of the same thing the two of them were staring at, shaking her head as she did while Delair rushed to speak up.

“Please don’t tell Mom about this.”

“I’m pretty sure I don’t have to. She’ll notice when she gets back. So, what exactly did you do here?”

“Nothing really.”

“Mmh. Mora?”

“I accidentally kicked a stone while running,” he admitted, feeling glum to have caused more destruction no matter how accidental it might have been, with the answer bringing a small surprised look to Hentath’s face.

“Alright. Delair got you to run, I take it?”

“She asked me to, but it was my fault. I wasn’t careful enough.”

“And we’ll fix it if you could just distract Mom and make sure she doesn’t come back early,” Delair pleaded, getting a heavy sigh in exchange.

“Alright, I suppose I could go keep her occupied for a little bit, but I mean only a little bit so if you’re going to fix it, work fast and don’t get distracted. Mora, do you think you could keep Delair focused?”

“Hey!”

“I’ll do my best,” he nodded, ignoring Delair’s look of clear betrayal before she focused on her great-grandmother.

“You and Mom both, does everyone just trust Mora more than me?”

“Little flower, everyone in the village loves you dearly, you know that.”

“So you trust me more, right?”

“No sweetheart, not at all.”

She chuckled as she said it, reaching out to ruffle the younger girl’s hair before walking off, leaving Delair pouting while Mora tugged on her arm.

“Um, Delair? If we’re going to fix it, then we should probably start.”

“Alright, fine, mister more-trustworthy-than-me. All of my stuff is around the back. It shouldn’t take too long.”

Ben had left her well supplied with tools and materials before he’d officially accepted her as an apprentice and while her current work meant that they weren’t seeing as much use as they had before she’d started in Stonewall, they were played with enough that everything was ready to go as the two looked at what she had and figured out how they wanted to start as Delair began loading his arms up with different logs of woods while she grabbed the tools and moved them to the side, directing him as she spoke up.

“Here, you start splitting these into planks, I’ll put them together as we go.”

“Alright.”

He’d helped out enough at the shop to know how to do that much and with the tools they had, Mora took a few wedges and forced them into each log, splitting them along the grain and he continued prying them apart from there, cutting through them with a hatchet and even just using his inherent strength to get the job done, handing each one over to Delair when he finished while she herself took a more delicate approach.

Using what chisels she had, Delair quickly cut grooves and channels into each one and fit the planks together, needing to force them with a mallet for how tight the hold was and from there had the rough shape of a door done, even if there was more work still to go.

As things were, the pieces were only held together by pressure and while she could have glued them to keep them secure, that would have still been drying by the time her mother came back, leaving her to opt for a different choice as she put her few levels of material user to work, binding the pieces together to make them whole, even as she struggled against her low level of skill still in that regard driving up the mana cost.

A struggle Mora was equipped to help with. When mana was stored within one’s soul, it fell within his domain and using his power he buffed both her pool and her recovery rate to let her keep using her magic, turning the separate planks into a single board and brought them all the closer to finishing, even if it looked like one of them was running out of steam.

“You okay?” Mora asked, seeing how tired Delair was starting to look, while she just gave a thumbs up.

“Yeah, we’ve just got to smooth it out, oil it, and add the handle after and then we’re done, which means we’ve gotta sand it. You do one side and I’ll do the other?”

“Alright, I’ll start,” Mora agreed, giving her a break as he grabbed a few grits of sand paper and progressively went through them as he worked his way across the door, the speed of his arms as he worked filling the air with dust until he had the sort of smooth surface they needed before flipping it over to do the other despite what they’d just agreed, a point Delair was more than willing to bring up.

“Hey, I’m-”

“Feeling on the edge of mana exhaustion,” Mora finished for her before she could argue. “Just sit for another few minutes. I’ll get this done and then we can work on the next bit.”

“Mmh, alright, fine.”

She wasn’t given much choice but to watch him work as he finished sanding, getting all sides and edges smooth and even until there was only two more things to do, with Delair grabbing a brush for both of them along with a bucket of oil, painting it on the door to give it some protection from both the environment as well as any pests that might have wanted to make their way through it.

Mora could tell she was using her magic again but didn’t comment. Close to mana exhaustion was still nothing like properly falling into it and she’d had her break. Besides, if they were going to finish, then she didn’t have a choice. They needed the oil to penetrate and, more importantly, they needed it to dry. Something that would normally take hours or days that they didn’t have if they were going to try to keep that little accident a secret.

But Fontesh is going to be able to tell she has a new door. Mora couldn’t help but notice, casting his eyes to the side before bringing up as much to see what answer Delair had in mind.

“Hhm?” Delair said, still focused more on the work. “We’ll just tell Mom we noticed the door was starting to crack and wanted to surprise her by replacing it. Not only do we not get in trouble, we get points for being so thoughtful too. It’s the perfect crime.”

“And if she asks what happened to the old door?”

“We broke it down into fertilizer, maybe we got you to ask some of the spirits in the area to help. Don’t worry, as long as Grandma doesn’t tell on us, then Mom won’t suspect a thing.”

“Well, alright.”

He personally had his doubts about really fooling Fontesh but at the very least, so long as they replaced what he’d broken then he doubted she’d be too mad and was happy to keep working, leaving only to fit in the handle and install the door itself, both easy compared to everything else as Delair ran into her home to grab the metal handle of the old one, only slightly bent from what it had been put through and easily reshaped under Delair’s power as she got to work drilling a few holes where it needed to go and secured it in place, leaving its construction finished and both of them looking proud.

“Come on,” Delair told him happily. “You carry it over and hold it in place. I’ll get it on the hinges… and also fix the hinges. It’s okay, we’re so close to being done.”

He did as she’d said, picking it up to move into place while she worked on the hinges, needing to remove the chunks of wood still attached to them and bend them back into shape before attaching them to the new door, getting to see as it swung comfortably closed, leaving Delair to jump for joy before a high five rung out between them, the girl looking almost smug by the end.

“Alright, looks like neither of us is getting in trouble today! We even still have time left before Mom comes back, so what should we do now? We could play some games or work on something new or-”

“Delair,” Mora cut her off, well aware that he was about to bring her down. “We’re not really done, are we?”

“Huh? What do you mean, of course we are? What else could there be to do?”

Mora opened the door, forcing Delair to really look inside instead of just focusing on their now finished project, making the girl aware of what was left. While thankfully there was no more than a small mark on the wall across from the door, something easily fixed with her magic, that didn’t change the fact that the entrance way was very much full of splinters and chunks of wood, all there and very obviously filling the space as he answered.

“We need to clean this up.”

“...Fine, I’ll grab the broom.”

Deflating with the chore still before her, the two could only tidy up before lunch arrived, marking the end to that busy morning.