To Fly the Soaring Tides

Chapter 282 - 275 - Origin

Cira stood before the obelisk trying to analyze it, but all her efforts were fruitless. No matter what she tried, the best she could do was look with her eyes. It seemed to completely repel her Spatial Sense, and various other perceptive spells were met with the same effect.

After a moment of contemplation, Cira put on a determined face and walked toward the obelisk. In a remarkable feat of foresight, she stopped directly before the mound of dirt and stretched out her hand.

As a historically reckless sorcerer, Cira was quite proud of herself and felt very wise for a brief moment until searing pain assailed her hand. She withdrew it with a sharp cry of pain. Her hand felt like it was about to explode.

The effect started to spread and she collapsed to the ground. Cira could only afford to concentrate on preventing whatever this was, but due to the pain it still took her a few seconds to even realize what was happening.

In a panic, she desperately tried to reconstruct the blood mana patterns in her body, but it was like trying to seamlessly mend a tapestry which had the corner burned off. No matter what she tried, the remaining blood patterns in her body only unfurled with greater vigor, as if all the vitality contained in her body was working toward that single effort.

With resignation and newfound fear in her heart, Cira took it upon herself to directly dismantle her blood domain. This resolved the emergency cleanly, but Cira was not happy about the result. She sighed and stood back from the obelisk once more.

This was not an attack from the obelisk or some kind of restriction. After that short ordeal, Cira understood the matter completely.

From the moment Cira crossed the boundary formed by the edge of the grass mound, all mana within her body was forcefully dispersed.

No… it felt more like it was erased. The moment my hand entered that space, almost like I forced myself into a domain far superior to anything I could muster, my own mana was absolutely rejected.

Well… I was curious to see what happens when a blood domain fails, wasn't I?

Cira thought she was being cautious but failed to so much as fathom such an accident. She was fairly confident in her hypothesis that a severed hand could be reattached by reforming her bloodflow pathways. If that wasn't how Roman achieved his resilience during their fight, then she was all out of ideas.

The problem here was that the boundary had completely erased the portion of her blood domain which resided in her hand. In this way, it was as if that section never existed, forcing the domain to be in a state where it never should have reached completion in the first place, so naturally it was impossible to reform. If Cira hadn't dismantled it herself, she would have likely exploded completely.

That alone added a short list of experiments to Cira's head. For one, if she exploded, would any part of her remain? Would the soul explode too? That would be difficult to test safely, but Cira had bigger things to worry about now. She decided not to reform the blood domain until she had time to at least play around with its reformation in the safety of her own home.

Reluctantly, Cira decided to move on with her life and dispel her various barriers. They hadn't been disrupted to such a degree, but there were holes in each of them at her wrist. Multiple area perceptive spells also collapsed, along with a few pockets in the aether she liked to prepare for unseen enemies.

Cira let out a resigned sigh as her shadow seemed to lose its depth while spatial threads she sent out to probe the Archive snapped and fizzled away. Her skin seemed to lose some luster as a thin layer of light disappeared, seeming to sink into her body.

Naturally, Cira had to change her clothes as well. She typically carried a few pairs but they were always enchanted. Luckily, however, she had some dresses among her pouches of residual treasure from Cirina Dreadheart's escapades. They were drab and not quite sorcerous, but Cira thought she didn't look too bad in the pallid yellow. This one came with a bonnet that she put on to keep that blinding light out of her eyes.

"Hmm…" There was still mana surrounding Cira and she actually had to inspect it before understanding dawned on her face. These spells took up practically nothing, drew directly from her aura without her assistance, and had slowly accumulated over a few jobs-worth of minor inconveniences.

Whirling mist brush against her skin clearly upon dispelling the spittle-rejection barrier she had come up with the moment her aura returned after spending so much time with pirates. The mist also brought with it a damp and dingy smell that was no longer suppressed by a spell she distinctly remembered casting after passing a line of latrines in the tunnels of Fount Salt.

How did these survive my soul breaking and reforming? Or were they forged back into my soul from their fractured traces? Hm…

Cira shook her head and moved on, dispelling the final spell which caused her robes to drift slightly even if there was no wind. She had no recollection of casting this one.

You could be reading stolen content. Head to the original site for the genuine story.

Now that was it for the easy part. There were still a few clear hurdles to cross before Cira was safe to approach the obelisk. First of all was the undine part of her constitution. She noticed the water mana which was usually an even spread throughout her body had receded from her hand the moment she crossed the boundary earlier.

Otherwise, the pain would have been much greater, and she may have succumbed to explosion. However, that much was hard to say because the sudden shift in her constitution greatly contributed to the intensity of her blood patterns' unraveling. Almost like it instinctively recoiled from the power emanating from the obelisk.

It was strange not being part undine in only her hand, but she realized it wasn't too jarring. She had lived most of her life without being a demi-spirit and the concentration of water mana was rather low considering beings like Undina or Destria.

So, the natural solution was to draw the rest of her undineliness completely into her soul. This was an incredibly strange feeling, but not difficult by any means. Cira then repeated the process with her aura.

Now everything was bundled up nice and tidy. The only mana Cira possessed was contained deep within her soul.

The final hurdle was, of course, to take her soul through the boundary. Cira's aura was inherently a part of her soul, no matter how deep she managed to stuff it, while her soul was by all definition an aethereal component of her essence. The aetherial component, to be more specific.

It could not be understated how relucted Cira was to separate her essence. This was something that should only happen at one's death, or the reforging of their souls. So, this wasn't really an option.

Instead, she was going to take something of a gamble.

Cira took a few deep breaths to clear her mind and looked to the purple wisp that had been observing her closely, "You stay here."

Cira once again stepped forward and slowly stretched out her hand. There was a slight wince on her face as her finger crossed the boundary, but no pain followed. As she plunged the rest of her hand and entire arm in, it actually felt somewhat rejuvinating.

One more step. Her leg entered the boundary and even her hip was starting to cross. There was no discomfort, nothing stirred within her body. There weren't even any fluctuations in her soul. Cira's breathing was steady.

Outwardly she seemed calm, but there was uncertainty in her heart. Cira moved slowly into the boundary.

Six inches. Five. Four…

Cira observed her soul carefully for anything unusual but still came up empty. Her soul had retracted to its most compact form ever, like a glass bead at the center of her chest.

Three… Two…

She took another few deep, but careful breaths. This approach had only taken a few seconds but felt like hours. Any moment now Cira's soul would make contact with the boundary of the obelisk.

Here we go…

She was too scared to even breath now, lest she plunge through on accident. Cira did her best to stretch the final distance the length of a speck of dust out as long as she could until at last…

Nothing.

No pain. No dispersal, no shattering.

"Phew…" She stepped through the boundary fully. "Really had me worried for a second."

Cira had won her bet, which meant in turn her guess was right. The power coming from the obelisk was in some way related to the soul, or perhaps vice versa.

She stepped from one stone to the next up a path formed through the eternally growing and dying grass. Cira didn't dare stray from the stepping stones and continued slowly up the short path. There was still no sign of trouble now that she had been within the boundary for a few moments, and Cira let out a sigh of relief.

It seemed she was truly safe and could finally approach the obelisk. The miniature sun at the top was positioned just out of arm's reach if she were to try and grab it, and she was thankful she had her bonnet to block the light.

The stone plaques began at around eye level, and Cira looked at the first one. It bore a detailed picture of a room that looked oddly familiar. It was lined with bookcases on every surface. There were strange runes overlayed, which struck Cira as some ancient form of sorcerous script.

"Huh…? What is this—" Cira turned to look toward the wisp outside, only to find it had positioned itself over her shoulder. "Ahh, of course you're immune to the obelisk."

A suspicious glint entered her eye as she double-took between the wisp and the plaque, but before she could say anything, the wisp moved toward the obelisk.

It drifted slowly, just like it had when it led her through its halls. Cira watched as it touched the obelisk and disappeared into the plaque depicting the Archive.

"Hm…" Cira had already gone this far, so she once again reached out with her hand. It may have seemed reckless, but Cira felt somehow certain that nothing bad would happen.

The moment she touched the plaque carved into the obelisk, it was like a jolt of lightning flooded her veins. Before enough time had passed to even feel the pain, Cira found herself standing in a plain room in the Archive, much like the one depicted in stone.

"Huh…? I'm getting tired of these games, you know—" A shrill whirring cut her off as it assailed her mind.

She instinctively threw her hands over her ears, but it was useless. The sound only got louder for a moment until something cracked. Suddenly it changed, like it was winding down, focusing. A pained roar came from somewhere distant then a hoarse voice echoed. It was like someone with no mouth trying to form words and she quickly turned to the direction it came from only to freeze in place.

An abyss of purple and black formed a vortex where the entire wall of the Archive was collapsing into. The entire space was folding toward it when that pained voice overpowered her consciousness.

"I AM—" Cira could feel her body starting to break down, "THE FIRST ORIGIN."

Cira utterly collapsed into the vortex, along with the surrounding archive, and this space became a true void.

The sharp sound of cracking stone shook Cira out of a stupor and she nearly tripped over herself, "Ahh!" Her first instinct was to scream after feeling her entire being disintegrate into base ingredients so profound she couldn't even identify them. Cira found herself panting, having caught her balance against something, only to recoil in horror to find her hand against the obelisk.

Luckily, she had not touched another plaque. The moment she regained her clarity though, she turned a fierce glare to the wisp.

It was dim, now laying on her shoulder like it had deflated. There was no glimmer to its form. She turned to the obelisk to find that noise earlier was first plaque breaking. A deep crack now ran through it.

"What… just happened?"