CH837

It was only as he finished up as much as he could in Stonewall that he passed through the gate to Anailia, relying on bind to tell him where to find Thera as he navigated the halls of her home to find far more than he’d expected, with the room holding not only her, Mora, and Bloom, but a variety of spirits as well, with connecting to them revealed them to be plant spirits.

“Well, looks like things have been interesting here,” He said, pulling their attention to him and forcing both Thera and Mora up.

“You’re hurt!” Mora said, racing to his side and getting a small chuckle for the unexpected level of energy as Ben rubbed his head.

“I’m fine, don’t worry too much.”

“You’re soul’s all torn up!”

“Happens from time to time, such is life.”

“Well I’ll fix it so stay still!”

That got him to raise an eyebrow as he looked at Thera, his girlfriend shaking her head. It looked like Mora wasn’t going to hide the way he’d use his magic anymore, at least not from them, but he’d have to wait to ask how things got to that point, with Thera taking his face in her hands to look him over.

“Did you stop at a healer before coming here?”

“Nah, why bother when anything less than an awakened one is going to do basically nothing?”

The answer was unexpected, her face scrunching up in surprise. “Your wounds are already a lot better… And it looks like you’re easier to heal now too.”

“Am I? Huh, I guess this is the first time I’ve needed to be healed since I became a demigod, neat.”

“I’d say that’s a little more than neat. You might even manage to see a decent effect if you tried to get help from a regular healer.”

“And that’s very cool, just not crazy unexpected. My healing rate did go up when I got my integrated demonic body too.”

“Yeah, but your healing enhancement merged into it to make it happen.”

“Well, yeah but if becoming part god doesn’t have any positive effects on my body then really, what’s the point?”

She just sighed and kept healing him, her and Mora both as his body and soul were slowly repaired from the damage they’d been put through, a silent agreement to talk about everything that had happened, but later. The day had been long and they each needed their rest, even if it seemed like one more thing was coming to break it as the door opened up, letting Pelenia and the rest of the great spirits inside.

All but the queen looked beaten down and tired in a way that defied their species, whatever they were already feeling only amplified as they went inside and saw all of the new plant spirits filling the room but with a swift elbow from his wife, Abrus bowed down as he spoke.

“Mora, we did not greet you properly when you arrived and for that we’re sorry, same to you Bloom. For better or worse among us, we great ones choose to view each other as siblings of sorts and before anything else, we should have remembered that. You’re both our kin now before anything else, we just need to adapt to this changing world. Of course, Mora, given your own circumstances whether you want to think of yourself as our brother or our nephew is completely up to you-”

“In the case of the rest of them,” Pelenia cut in, practically glowing. “Since I’m married to this oaf, you can call him grandpa.”

“...You can think of me however you’re most comfortable and we’ll all accept it but for now, we’d like to hear what happened before you arrived if you’d please. We promise we’ll listen until you’re done.”

Mora looked to Thera, feeling unsure until she took his hand.

“It’s okay, Mora. Me and Ben are here for you.”

“...Alright.”

With the two by his side, Mora told them what had happened and what he’d done, with Thera, Ben, and Bloom all adding details where they could while the other spirits listened, all of them looking conflicted by the end of it all.

“Who would have thought a change in our souls could alter our nature to such an extent,” Funa muttered as Lux thought aloud.

“What else do we have to change though? Mana is normally stored in the soul but we ourselves are mana, it always had to be our souls dictating our nature but…”

“But who would have thought a change like that could happen?” Abrus sighed. “No soul mage nor god we’ve ever met has ever implied that they thought something like this would be possible.”

“But no matter how powerful they may be, they’d never be as attuned to their magic as one of our kin,” Lux pointed out. “And it’s something that would have never been discovered in the first place if we hadn’t been bound to the system.”

“True, but now that we know… Well, I’m not going to advocate for bringing it up to the other three right now, all things considered, but we should at least get Salinoth here to fill him in and discuss where to go from here. Considering the implications, there’s still going to be a lot to talk about.”

“But it’s getting late,” Funa pointed out. “Thera and Ben both need their rest, especially with all they’d been through. Bloom, Mora, would you both want to join us for a bit while those two get some sleep?”

“I will,” Bloom agreed while Mora shook his head, grabbing Thera’s hand tighter.

“I want to stay with them.”

“If that’s what you’d like it’s fine,” The dark spirit told him. “But won’t that be boring?”

“I can entertain myself.”

“Alright, if you’re sure.”

“And I won’t sleep long anyway,” Ben added. “Give me two hours and I’ll be fine.”

“...Ben, that doesn’t sound healthy.”

“Eh, it’s fine, I can make it up later.”

“And I’ll wake up early too then,” Thera added. “And then you can all fill us in on whatever you need to in the morning, okay?”

“Alright then, in that case, sleep well.”

The day had been exhausting with all that happened and despite how much more there still felt like there was to do, they trudged back up to Thera’s room, looking at the gate it held before flopping on her bed instead, Mora choosing to sit on the edge of it while Ben materialized a few things to keep the boy entertained.

With him covered though they both needed some rest, with only one final thing to do as he pulled Thera into his head for the privacy it would give.

“So I finally learned why Mora doesn’t want to use his magic,” She sighed, leaning into him while he waited for more. “I guess the issue is morality and I have no clue if I handled it well.”

“Meaning?”

“He doesn’t want to use his magic to hurt people, with demons being included. I guess my stupid aunt was trying to make him. Hell, since she said he wouldn’t use his magic in general I wouldn’t be surprised if that’s the only thing she tried to get him to do without even touching all of those little aspects of soul magic we’ve already seen him doing.”

“Damn, okay, then what did you tell him?”

“Ugh, I told him that if he didn’t want to then he didn’t have to and I think that was the right choice but I don’t know so I’d sure like some reassurance please.”

“Ha, it was the right choice,” He told her, rubbing her head as he did. “Yeah, if he was willing to then maybe that would have been better for everyone but he’s a kid, he shouldn’t be forced to kill if he doesn’t want to and I don’t know about you but considering how powerful great spirits are, I’m a lot more comfortable with the idea that he be against killing than super into it.”

“Thanks, that’s exactly what I needed to hear.”

“I also believe it if that’s worth anything too.”

“Ha, I know you do. So enough about that now, how did things go in town then?” She asked, having noted one area that had yet to really come up in all of their talks while he just shrugged.

“I rebuilt it but a lot of people aren’t going to be happy with me I’m sure, I made sure to tell everyone that everything that happened was because of an experiment I messed up on. On the plus side though, I cut down all of the plants, rebuilt the houses and items, and left some compensation at the guild so hopefully that makes plenty feel forgiving.”

“Or terrified,” She laughed. “You did all of that with your jacket? Used millions of points of mana?”

“Yeah.”

“I feel like the bigger concern then would be whether you’re secretly a god.”

“Ha, no way. I mean, I did get a few looks and the thoughts I looked at were kind of focused on replaying everything they’d seen happen across the day so I couldn’t really get many reactions beyond that by the time I left but I think I’ll just be happy if nobody tries to run me out of town.”

“Ha, who would be insane enough to try and do anything like that?”