4.33 Chicken noise

Difference: Minimal

After sorting his thoughts, Irwyn explained about the effects of the mark he had discovered as well as his conclusions to the rest of the group. Well, to the most of them. Waylan was getting visibly uninterested for obvious reason and slightly annoyed that this was going to be the main conversation topic for a bit.

“It could indeed be quite powerful,” Elizabeth evaluated. “But you shouldn’t become over-reliant on using just the left hand to channel magic. Such bad habits can be harmful in the long-term or if you happen to lose that hand.”

“I will keep that just for combat then,” Irwyn nodded.

“What will happen if that hand gets severed,” Alice questioned.

“Hopefully not much,” Desir guessed. “The Concept should be imprinted onto his Soul, the remaining carving I estimate to be more of a semi-direct link rather than the whole thing. More of a mark than the Concept itself.”

“I agree,” Irwyn nodded. “While it does radiate a good amount of heat, it is nowhere near a fraction of what the Concept itself would.”

“Probably still best not to test it,” Elizabeth decided. “It is actually quite rare for Conception mages to lose a limb while keeping the rest of their body in one piece. If you are in the blast radius of something, the length of a body will rarely make a difference.”

“Well, that Chosen in the desert was literally throwing spears at us,” Alice pointed out. “Those could have sliced off just an arm very easily. Some combat wisdom from the Federation might not apply around here.”

“Rare doesn’t mean non-existent,” Elizabeth elaborated with a shake of her head. “Take me, for example, since I will fight in close range for the most part. I could technically cut off an enemy’s appendage but if I am already close enough for that, then I might as well have gone for the head instead. At the speed I can already move at - not to mention when I progress further - it’s highly improbable that the little bit of distance would make a difference or that an enemy could physically get out of the way.” 

“But he could get there to some extent,” Desir interjected. “I couldn’t help but notice that Irwyn does have a somewhat superhuman physique. He would definitely be able to learn some proper footwork, even if only to dodge.”

“That requires training and extensive practice to be anything more than a blind desperate dodge,” Elizabeth remained in disagreement. “Which is irrelevant to anything that can breach his barriers.”

“I used to do that a lot,” Irwyn pointed out. “I won a duel with you like that at least once or twice, actually.”

“In earlyish imbuement,” she chuckled. “Every attack is faster and larger in Conception, yet the space within your barrier remains the same. To have the equivalent maneuverability, you would need to upscale your spell to the surface area of a large house or more - not exactly practical. Rather than investing time into a poor last measure, it would be better to make sure you are not pushed into such desperate straits instead.”

“Fair.” Irwyn nodded, then changed the topic. “I still have some things to test but those should be less destructive. We can get going, though probably carry me a bit to the side, just in case.”

“Do we actually have an idea where we are going?” Desir asked

“Nope,” Waylan chimed in. “In here, we travel by vibes.”

“North,” Elizabeth pointed up drily but smiled. “After I have a look at my mother’s old family, of course.”

“Unless we have already passed our destination and it’s actually South,” Alice suggested.

“We wouldn’t have…” Elizabeth started and then paused, the four original members exchanging a glance. It would be very much like the fae to actually bring them further North than their destination, wouldn’t it? Though thinking that Irwyn knew there was no point in even trying to voice it out before Desir spoke up.

“Maybe I would be able to help with at least some landmarking,” he offered. “I am somewhat traveled. The odds are not great but I might be able to guess a vague direction from hearsay.”

“You have not been North for all that long,” Irwyn said doubtfully. “And spent most of that time in that Time-dilation beast.”

“You wound me, Irwyn!” Desir exclaimed with a grin. “I actually once made a great journey along these parts before someone helped me move to the Federation.”

“When did you have the time to do that,” Irwyn frowned. Desir still looked to be not much older than 20, definitely under 30… but what did that matter for someone who could clearly shapeshift? “Actually, how old even are you?”

“Younger than I look,” Desir said, though not giving an exact number but instead tapping his chest. “But I grew up quickly. Not all human blood in here, which I am pretty sure actually goes for the majority of this group.”

“Why do you say so?” Elizabeth inclined her head with curiosity.

“Irwyn is a half guess from how ridiculous he is but you are pretty obvious, your ladyship von Wrath,” Desir mock bowed. “That demon was proper terrified of you despite being much stronger. Even the Blackburg lineage cannot account for that… but elven blood would.”

“Very knowledgeable about demons, are you?” Elizabeth frowned slightly but did not deny the claim.

“You pick up a thing or two when they are after you,” he shrugged. “On a different note, do you people always sidetrack every conversation?”

“Yes,” Waylan answered instantly, earning a glare from everyone else.

“Then to rewind, you said something about our ultimate destination?”

“We are looking for a desert surrounded by glass mountains,” Elizabeth confessed after brief hesitation.

“Huh,” Desir paused, looking at her in clear surprise, then laughed. “Us meeting truly has to be Fate. What are the odds?”

“I take it you have actually been there?” Irwyn guessed, also startled by that coincidence.

“Not only been there, I used to be a caravanner there for several years,” he chuckled. “Well, more of a child laborer but that is beside the point. I knew the area pretty well, Void, I might actually even have some old acquaintances still kicking!”

“Do you know which way to head then?” Elizabeth asked, visibly pleased by the news. Her original decision to deliberately not chart their way while they had real maps in the name ‘adventure’ had perhaps earned some mild regret.

“Definitely still North,” Desir nodded. “I remember there were two and a half nations between the desert and this Kingdom. I was actually planning to pay it a visit at some point.”

“Didn’t you pass through here when you had left for the Duchy?” Alice frowned.

“Not… exactly,” Desir smiled. “The ride I was fortunate enough to get did not have much of a window. Well, at least not one I could appreciate passing scenery through.”

“Then we will head there… after the promised visit to my distant relatives,” Elizabeth decided.

“Find us the nearest town and I can get us directions,” Desir nodded. “And while we fly, I can do a bit of the promised tutoring on how to not look like a bumpkin to the locals.”

“Count me out, I still have magic to figure out,” Irwyn reminded as Elizabeth lifted them up with her platforms. Void for everyone except Irwyn who got Flame - and a bit of distance from the group as well as a barrier between them. That taken care of, Irwyn looked inward again as the five of them took off.

The thought that had struck him was upgrading his old spells. Starting with the Empyrean Blood he had used earlier, naturally. Which he had expected to be a simple matter… only to quickly find the Concept would not attach to it whatsoever. Confused and frowning, Irwyn tried to shift, change, and even downscale the whole spell only to be repeatedly met with failure. Trying different things, the problem finally became apparent when he separated the elements within that spell.

Empyrean Blood was both in name and structure based on Starfire. It had not even occurred to Irwyn that even though that element was formed from Flame and Light, that his Concept would draw such a radical boudary between the two. But the inability was clearly observably, leading him to the only possible conclusion. That while Irwyn only held the Concept of Flame, it could not be applied to the usually superior prismatic element of Starfire.

The downside of carving the partial Concepts separately before merging them. It was not the biggest problem as Irwyn would be ready for Light soon, if Elizabeth’s progress was anything to go by… Actually. Irwyn got distracted and chose to better examine the state of his Soul due to an inkling. The ‘egg’ was still present but he was able to get a general feeling through it. Namely that the core of his being remained completely tranquil.

Unlike during Imbuement, the bottlenecks of Conception were not really raw cognitive ability and mana reserves needed to keep up with the multiplicative difficulty between each additional intention added. In big part because each carving would expand both much further than training would, easily outpacing the requirements. Rather, the issue was the stability and mass of the Soul. 

Literally cutting into the essence of one’s being was not exactly a pleasant experience for it after all. After each Concept was carved, the Soul would need time to settle from the disturbance. However, besides the increased vulnerability to magic targeting it in that period, this was not what held back most mages. The real problem they faced was the ‘size’ of the Soul. In more figurative than literal sense. Simply put, a weaker Soul did not have the ‘area’ to carve another concept without disturbing the previous.

He and Elizabeth would be different though. She had long predicted that their progress through Conception would be rapid and for a good reason. With each new Carving, the Soul would expand proportionally to its pre-existing power. For most mages that meant getting perhaps halfway to the next boundary, requiring them to slowly accumulate the rest - even with all the existing Concepts facilitating growth multitudes faster than any imbuement mage could hope for. 

Irwyn and Elizabeth however would more than fulfil the requirement immediately. Since the growth following every carving was proportional to what was already present, their innately more powerful Souls could instantly fulfill the requirement for the following Concept. In other words, once their Souls had settled from the first breakthrough, they could immediately carve again.

There would likely be a limit to that. Since the minimal requirements would keep getting progressively larger, the head start would eventually not be enough, worn out by each breakthrough that only earned a part of the original lead back. Elizabeth expected she would be able to get to at least seven or eight Concepts before her tempo crumbled - and then her Soul would still grow faster than a normal mage of equivalent power could expect. That was accounting for the mergers she had planned that would help keep up with the curve. Irwyn on the other hand could feasibly never even meet that bottleneck.

Which brought him back to the current observation. There was no ripple or disturbance in Irwyn’s Soul, as if it had already settled. No matter how powerful, that was beyond his expectations. Given his… unusual carving method he had actually expected the turmoil to be greater. A part of him had hoped that the Concept transferring from flesh rather than being directly carved would be easier, but the opposite seemed more plausible. Since he relied on the last step to be automatic, it was unlikely that it would happen gently… Yet the opposite seemed to be the case, suggesting that perhaps he had been wrong or just lucky. After a moment of thought though Irwyn realized there was a different explanation: His vision!

During imbuement, each vision had been followed by a noticeable growth in his ability to wield magic as well as mana reserves. While the latter had eventually grown hard to estimate due to the sheer quantity, the former effect was undeniable. However, since the vision had followed his carving of a Concept so immediately, Irwyn could only assume those were still its effects. But a different possibility made itself apparent. It was quite possible that the vision had also instantly calmed his Soul down, making it ready for another carving.

That was a satisfying and sensible conclusion, though Irwyn would run it by the group later just in case. Still, that would quickly solve his problem with weakened Starfire. Once he had carved his second Concept, he would be able to merge them shortly after. Since he had decided to follow Elizabeth’s advice at least on the first few carvings, he would merge Flame and Light into Star, then recarve the first two before merging all three into full Starfire. But even with just Star as his Concept, it should be perfectly suitable to empower the element.

That still stirred another thought: Would he be able to use the concept on the Composite parts? Would Starfire still be applicable for his Flame and Light spells, or would he need to solely rely on the prismatic elements thereafter? A Concept should in theory provide enough power and flexibility to make even the combined element comparable at any task even to the few things the two were better at individually but Irwyn held some worries. The sheer melting heat of his earlier sphere had been difficult to suppress due to how he had chosen to form the concept and that would not just go away. If he even needed to make Concept empowered spells without wanting his less heat-resistant friends to suffer, would he still need to expend literally twice the willpower and mana?

Irwyn wondered how other mages dealt with it, opting to not ask Elizabeth right away. His first thoughts were directed at Johnson who Irwyn knew had a prismatic element, but the man still seemed perfectly capable of both Soul and Life magic. The Doctor however might be a horrible example, given he had almost certainly attained a Truth or at least many domains, clearly transcending the possible limits of Conception mages. 

The next example was the Singing man, or Old Hummingbird, back in Abonisle. The Fowl clearly wielded an element at the very least similar to Sound, which Alice had mentioned was a real prismatic element. Irwyn tried to think whether he had ever seen the old man use any other magic but it was difficult to draw conclusions from the lack of such examples. Back then, Irwyn had been far too weak, his senses imprecise. Not to mention that even if that hadn’t been the case, the man might not have even used any other element. The issue was, he could not recall closely interacting with anyone else who fit the bill besides Elizabeth herself.

“I see a town,” Alice’s voice sounded, interrupting his thoughts. The others had obviously been talking during their flight, though that exclamation was enough to get his attention.

“Let me off here then,” Desir nodded. “Azaelas, was it?”

“Maybe I will come along,” Elizabeth decided, the platforms under her control quickly descending. “It could be worthwhile to have a firsthand look.”

“Of course, Lady Blackburg,” Desir immediately made an exaggerated bow, which earned him the disappearance of the magical ground beneath his feat. Unlike Waylan though, Desir was not caught off guard by the trick, instead easily turning his fall into a somersault and landing steadily on his feet. 

“Show off,” Alice snorted.

“The Baroness only hires the best,” Desir proclaimed, back straight and face solemn.

“Is that what we are going with?” Elizabeth asked with some amusement as she gracefully landed.

“You cannot just claim to be from a Duchy no one has ever heard of,” Desir shrugged. His clothes were also actively turning into a black suit while his hair began graying. Even his facial expression shifted again. Within a dozen seconds, Desir took on the appearance of an old butler who would not look out of place in City Black. Then he led the way, already getting into the role.

“We will not be too long, I expect,” Elizabeth at least turned back to wave goodbye, which the trio returned.

“I would expect you to tag along,” Irwyn then glance at Waylan who was already stepping to the side to a small meadow of scattered trees.

“Irw, buddy, fuck you for that,” Waylan nodded, sitting down by one of the trees. “It’s making me mad you don’t even realize the problem.”

“That is hardly warranted,” Irwyn frowned. “What has you in a foul mood?”

“Irwyn, this has been a long ass fucking day and I am tired,” Waylan stared him down. “I still need to sleep unlike you monsters. Which, by the by, goodnight.”

Then Waylan closed his eyes and ignored any further inquiries. He was out in perhaps moments judging by his breathing. Which was in hindsight understandable. Alice sighed, then teleported two blankets over to the sneak - one under and the other over him. 

“Complaining about his frail mortal body, then sleeping on the gold ground,” she shook her head in disbelief. 

“Very motherly of you,” Irwyn sagely nodded.

“I haven’t tested how far up I could teleport you now, after the breakthrough,” she turned to him, smiling viciously. “Care to see for yourself?”

“I presume that threat works on people who cannot easily fly?” Irwyn raised an eyebrow.

“Spoilsport.”

“My apologies, I will be sure to cower next time.”

“I hope I am not interrupting?” a new, unfamiliar voice sounded from behind them, making the duo flinch. Irwyn had felt nothing but was already reaching for his magic. When he actually saw what had appeared behind them though, he paused.

There suddenly stood a carriage with a large window open in its side, revealing a large counter which displayed various wares. Clearly the coach of a traveling peddler, though without a beast of burden to drag it along - and notably just manifesting out of nowhere. The man next to it was also familiar to Irwyn, if a bit distantly. It had been a while but the merchant had certainly left an impression. Like the first time they had met, Time and Fate gently swirled around the man, following unknowable patterns under such precise control Irwyn could barely appreciate it even with his new Concept.

“And Irwyn too!” Bhaak exclaimed with a large smile. “Pleasure to make and re-make your acquaintance!”