006

It Lives in the Woods

For testing purposes, Vaughan had disabled the ‘steering’ option on the drive and encased it in a wooden box that made it blatantly obvious which direction it would be pushing itself from a single, red-painted face. He refused to say where he’d gotten the paint. The “drive-box” was mounted on the underside of a wooden chair, which in turn had a levitator strapped on top of it. A simple arcane conduit led from the drive’s box to the chair’s armrest, where it could be occupied by the occupant.

The chair itself was covered in various bits of adhesive and leather straps that did their best to keep it from falling apart but made it look like it belonged in a hospital bed. Which it probably did, the poor thing had been physically brutalized. There was a reason the drive was safely nested within the box: when the chair inevitably exploded, the super-expensive piece of equipment wasn’t dashed into a million pieces. So far, no matter how badly Jeh had crashed the chair, not a single one resulted in actual damage to the drive.

Vaughan dusted his hands together. “Ready, my little crashaholic?”

Jeh forced a smile. “Ready!” I wish Blue would hurry up and get back so we can… I don’t know, do something else. She climbed into the chair and strapped herself in. Already she could feel the looseness of the left armrest—evidentially it hadn’t been glued back together as well as it could have been.

“Well, get on with it then. Activate the drive!”

Jeh placed her bare hand on the Magenta interface while she clutched an Orange chunk in her other hand. You know, I do miss having my mitts on all the time, but contact is contact. She pushed her will into the Magenta interface. The first time they’d done this they’d had to set the drive to the combined weight of Jeh and the chair, adding a few pieces of wood to the back just to get everything “balanced.” Since it was already calibrated she could just activate it… and become weightless.

Initially, there was no physical difference before and after the activation of the drive aside from a few colored sparks coming from the interface; the wooden casing around the drive blocked out the other light. Jeh and the haphazard chair remained seated, still, on the ground.

Jeh tapped her foot on the ground; prompting her and her chair to, at a snail’s pace, rise into the air. Already she could feel the chair starting to tilt backward. The haphazard arrangement of levitator, chair, and drive was not, by any means, balanced and so the force of the drive pushed it to the side.

This was what the Orange in her other hand was for. Pushing into it, she directed the spell at the brass disc of the levitator, distributing the gentle force in such a way that it forced the chair upright while also keeping it floating in the air.

“Steady?” Vaughan asked.

“Steady,” Jeh confirmed, bracing herself for what came next.

“Then… prepare yourself, small one!” Vaughan held up his scepter, tapping into Purple first. The spell generated a continuous burst of random color in front of Jeh’s eyes, effectively blinding her to what Vaughan was doing. The reasoning was that “you can’t see the wind, so you shouldn’t be able to see me” but Jeh was still certain it was unfair.

Vaughan had a few tricks up his sleeve. Yellow was the simplest: he’d try to empathically connect with Jeh. All she had to do was resist to block that. It was easy enough, but she was an open individual so she had to be constantly on guard, which increased her susceptibility to his other tricks.

A burst of wind hit her in the face, tipping her chair over. She quickly adjusted with her magic by pushing on the disc at an angle, returning to an upright position. Obviously, she had been pushed a distance across the backyard, but she couldn’t exactly tell where given the flashes in front of her eyes.

Jeh knew exactly what Vaughan was doing: ever since they’d made discoveries about air, he’d been using Orange to push air around and had discovered that he could make a pretty impressive wind. Apparently wind magic had been a “great Orange wizard secret” he’d not been able to figure out before.

Jeh also knew what he was going to do next. He was going to send a few more breezes her way to give her a false sense of security, and then he was going to use Blue magic to increase the speed of his output and hit her with many more gusts of wind in quick succession. All she had to do was focus, resist, an—

The burst of wind came from several different directions. She let out a yelp as she tried to stabilize, but as she pushed on the disc a gust of wind came from another direction and used her own force against her, sending her into a tailspin back down to the ground.

She cracked a few ribs but that was inconsequential compared to the complete loss of the chair’s backing.

“And I win again!” Vaughan declared.

“Yeah, you… win,” Jeh said, standing up and rubbing the back of her head as her ribs twisted back into place. “How ab—“

“Fix it and do it again.”

Jeh let out a little whimper, but did her best to hide it from Vaughan, instead giving him a smile. “Can’t we, maybe, take a… break?”

“You don’t need breaks.” Vaughan shrugged, taking a chair of his own and kicking his feet up on the table with all the Yellow tops on it. “You can just regenerate through the exhaustion.”

“I… true…”

“Then fix the chair and we’ll do it again.” Vaughan picked up one of the tops and twirled it within his fingers. “Fastest way to get you space-ready.”

Remind me again why we have to get me ready quickly? “I’m a little hungry.”

“You told me you don’t need food.”

“I still like it,” Jeh huffed.

Vaughan thought about this for a moment. “Fine. Go have a sandwich, but get back out here as quickly as you can. There’s work to be done!”

“Work… yay…” Grumbling, Jeh marched back into the cabin. Vaughan didn’t notice her attitude, for he had busied himself scribbling some notes down on a loose piece of paper about Jeh’s performance.

I bet he’s writing about how “unsatisfactory” I am.

Jeh sighed. Why can’t Blue get back already? Rein this moron in for me.

~~~

Krays and Darmosil, the loudest couple for many miles, had eventually followed up on their previous idea to go “monster hunting” for the heck of it. Naturally, there was a lot of shouting involved. And now that they were in the midst of the forest, there was still shouting involved.

“—and that is why cat names are stupid!” Krays declared.

“You’re scaring away the animals we’re supposed to be hunting,” Darmosil deadpanned.

“Anything big enough to be interesting won’t be scared off by a couple gari shouting at the top of their lungs!”

“One gari.”

“There are two gari here!”

“There is one gari shouting at the top of her lungs.” Darmosil nonchalantly took out a buttery bread roll from his pack and bit into it, chewing obnoxiously slowly while never breaking eye contact with his wife.

“I can be vicious and quiet,” Krays whispered with a malevolent grin.

“Much better.”

“Oh, I’m not letting that get me…” Continuing her vicious whisper, she danced around him, tapping him lightly in several places along his armor—which he had naturally forged himself. She took special care to touch the spots that had minor imperfections that she knew really bothered him.

“At least I have armor,” he said, gesturing at her. She only had on her basic hiking outfit, a set of rippled glass rings wrapped around her wrists, and an exceptionally long glass pole strapped to her back. “You aren’t exactly the most effective warrior of all time.”

“What I lack in gear I make up for in fire.”

“Fire is traditionally associated with red gari.”

“And you’re about as warm as an iceberg at the bottom of the ocean.”

“I don’t think there are icebergs at the bottom of the ocean.”

“How do you know?”

“Ice floats.”

“Then where does all the cold stuff at the bottom of the ocean go? Hmm, mister?”

“Actually, come to think of it…” Darmosil tapped his chin. “Ice floats in water, but iron doesn’t float in molten iron... Of all the materials we work with…”

“No, Darmosil, stop, that Blue’s been getting into your head with her constant questions! Don’t fall to the temptation!”

“Blue’s been gone for a while.”

“Her corruption is insidious!”

He tilted his head to the side. “No, that’s the Sourdough twins you’re thinking of.”

“Well that goes without saying, and you said it.”

“I…”

A howling burst of bubbling noises hit both of their ears at the same time, making them drop the conversation immediately and go on the defensive. Krays stood behind her husband, carefully rotating her glass rod between both of her hands. Darmosil spread his limbs wide to extend the area his armored self took up while also drawing both of his swords—magnificent metal weapons with cores of Red in them. He’d already activated the crystals, heating up the blades significantly, not that anyone could see a visual difference.

They heard it again, coming from somewhere south of their current position. After determining that it wasn’t a predator hunting the two of them, Krays dashed toward the sound, rod held as though it were a spear. As she ran, she followed her ears: the bubbly call could only mean one thing, and that one thing would be the greatest find ever in this forest, so far as they knew. Ripashi would be so jealous!

She jumped forward, entering a small clearing where the beast itself stood. It was a pink, eight-legged thing with wet, rippling skin. Two massive yellow eyes dominated its front, below which were two large tentacles with triangular tips at the ends. It was comparable in size to an elephant. However, quite unlike an elephant, it was currently gorging itself on the carcass of a deer.

“Gotcha, fish-foot.” Krays twirled her rod around, but not to smack the beast; it looped around a hook in her pouch, removing a glass sphere. She twisted her rod wide, throwing the hooked sphere right into the creature’s face. The sphere was designed to shatter on contact into as many sharp and aggravating shards as possible, and it did exactly as it was supposed to.

“Tagged!” Krays called back.

“On it!” Darmosil was significantly slower in his armor, but that worked to their advantage. While the injured beast was charging Krays, Darmosil was able to run into the clearing at a slightly offset angle, coming at the target from the side. His blades cut through the two tentacles in one fell slice, cooking the meat enough to fill the air with a delicious aroma. It was enough to make Krays’ mouth water in anticipation.

Lacking its tentacles, the beast refused to give up. It charged for Darmosil instead, since he was more visibly threatening—but that was its final mistake. It had to pass by Krays to get a good chance of stomping Darmosil. Krays took full advantage of this by launching her fist forward into the beast’s remaining eye. The glass band around her wrist shattered. The beast was cut into while Krays remained unharmed, her natural gari armor resisting the blades of glass.

This allowed her to push her fist further and further into the beast, cutting it up. Without its eyes and under that much pain, it was unable to resist as Darmosil finished it off by plunging his sword right through it.

The beast moved no more.

“Heck yeah! A cephalid!” Krays immediately did a little victory dance, subconsciously flicking squid juice off her hand as she did so. “I’ve never seen one around here!”

“They typically like wetter climates,” Darmosil noted. “Though they are known to follow rivers.” He used the tip of his heated sword to cut off two bits of the cephalid’s flesh, giving a piece to each of them. “Quite delicious.”

Krays munched on her piece, clicking her tongue a few times. “Sometimes I miss the ocean. Terrestrial squid just aren’t the same, you know?”

“I prefer terrestrial squid.”

“Suuuure you do.”

“I do.”

“Just because I—“

Both of them felt a roar so immense that it made their usually-rigid hair whip around like they were in a wild breeze. Their very bones shivered, resonating with the shrill reverberation.

They both looked up, coming face-to-face with the owner of that roar. The creature sat, mounted in the branches of a nearby tree that were barely strong enough to hold its girth. Its body was a smooth, pristine white with a plastic-like texture, the tell-tale sign of a plast lifeform. It had two wings that resembled shark fins more than anything else, albeit with sharp talons at the edges. Its two legs lacked toes of any sort; instead, they were circular discs that twisted and warped with a rippling motion to grab hold of the branches. Contrasting the creature’s largely white complexion was its chest that had a strange glow to it; continually shifting colors, as though there were fireworks going off in its stomach that could barely be seen from the outside.

Wrapping all of this together was its head, situated at the end of an elongated neck with numerous glowing rings along the back. The face consisted of five piercing blue eyes, two on either side of its face and one in the center of its forehead. Two horns protruded from the back of its head, while the mouth had no teeth. Rather, the creature’s lips were jagged and razor-sharp.

Krays had no idea what it was, but she wasn’t about to look like a fool. “A plast dragon!”

“A what?”

“A plast. Dragon.”

“Krays, you have no idea what this is.”

“In that case, I just named it. It’s a pla—“

The plast dragon let out another roar, opening its mouth to reveal a very purple throat shimmering with rings of light that moved up and down the interior with a mesmerizing motion.

Krays flicked her rod around and loaded another of the shattering balls. “Oh, you have no idea what you’re getting into, buddy.”

The plast dragon changed the tone of its roar, narrowing it until it was a single high-pitched note that made Krays’ ears hurt. The instant she decided this probably qualified as an attack, every glass object on her person shattered. Since all of those were in her protected hands or safely stowed away in her pack, she wasn’t subject to the immediate agony of glass shards cutting her everywhere, but she was still left defenseless.

Krays glanced at her husband. “Hey, you be the man for once.”

“Har-de-har,” Darmosil said, flaring both of his blades to his sides.

The plast dragon jumped down from the tree, slamming both of its legs on the ground hard enough to create the illusion of an earthquake.

Krays’ smile vanished. Even something that big shouldn’t be able to make that large of a quake.

“Darmosil…”

Darmosil was already backing away from the creature. “I felt it.”

“Run first. You’ll be slower.”

“Bu—“

“Run, idiot!”

Darmosil finally listened. He turned around and ran in the direction of Willow Hollow. The plast dragon lifted its wings, ready to take to the air—but Krays had other plans.

“Hey, overgrown gauntlet fuel!” She plucked a shard of glass out of her pouch and threw it at the dragon’s face. It bounced harmlessly off, but it was annoying enough to draw the beast’s attention once more. It lunged at her.

Krays whipped out a Blue crystal and accelerated herself. She was nowhere near as skilled as Blue wizards at manipulating the magic within, but she was more than capable of casting the weaker versions of the default spell: self-acceleration. From her point of view, everything slowed down slightly—the dragon, the wind blowing through the leaves in the trees, and the footsteps of her loud, retreating husband.

With her boon, she was able to twist away from the plast dragon’s lunge without a single scratch. It, however, didn’t relent after one missed attack: it scratched with the tips of its wings and tried to bite her, but she was far too agile to be captured by such simple attacks.

Then it let out a roar. This one was different from the others. It hit Krays like a horse, the invisible sound barreling into her so hard that she fell back. It was like no attack she had ever felt; it didn’t hit her chest and drag her along, it hit her ribs and the organs inside of them, pulling on every part of her in unison. She was fortunate her back didn’t break from the immediate strain.

He’s hopefully gotten enough of a head start now… finding it hard to breathe, she forced her will back onto the Blue crystal and took off as fast as she could manage back toward Willow Hollow, though at a slightly different vector than Darmosil had taken.

Her breathing only became more haggard as she ran. She vaguely remembered something Vaughan had said once about exertion while under Blue acceleration being more difficult, but she didn’t have time to worry about that right now.

She could hear the beast behind her. Its roar was one of determined defiance.

It was ready for the hunt.

~~~

“Ready?”

Jeh forced a smile. “Ready!”

The chair’s backing broke and fell to the ground.

Jeh’s left eye twitched. “Lemme… fix that…”

“You do that,” Vaughan said, sitting back down in his chair and returning to his notes.

Trying (and failing) not to grumble to herself, Jeh picked the chair’s backing off the ground and started applying more adhesive to it, after which she wound more of the leather straps around it like a bandage.

Now they just had to let it sit for a few minutes. A time interval long enough to be annoying but not long enough to warrant her wandering off to find some entertainment elsewhere. She began loudly tapping her foot.

“You know for someone who has such a muddled conception of time, you sure get bored reliably.”

Jeh gave Vaughan one of the worst fake smiles ever—but he didn’t look at it, he continued scribbling down his notes.

That’s it, Jeh thought. I’m going to give him a piece of m—

“Helloooo~!” a sing-song voice called. It belonged to a certain pink gari who had just rounded the cabin and set foot in the backyard. “Hope I’m not interrupting anything!”

“We’re just waiting, Seskii,” Vaughan said, rolling up his scroll. “What brings you here?”

“Suro mentions your backyard a lot and I wanted to see it! I have to say, it does not disappoint! It really does look like a war-torn battlefield!” She giggled as she gestured at an old, blackened crater in the ground.

Vaughan grinned. “Suro sings such high praises!”

“I can tell Suro’s a great friend,” Seskii said, her expression becoming slightly more serious for a moment before returning to its normal, cheery self. “And little Jeh, how are you doing?”

“I crash. A lot.” Jeh gestured at the terrible mess of a chair.

“Hmm…” Seskii put a hand to her chin. “You know what this means?”

“Huh?”

“You need a little reward for trying so hard.” Seskii reached into her pack and pulled out a small bottle filled with a purple liquid.

“What is that?”

“It’s grape juice,” Seskii said. “Not wine. This will not make your head spin like a loose wagon wheel. But it will be refreshing!”

With a shrug, Jeh took the drink. It was outrageously sweet and that was exactly what she needed right now. The first taste was enough to get her to down the entire thing in a handful of seconds. “You make good juice.”

“I try my best!”

“Blue says you tried to fool everyone with potions.”

“She would say that, now wouldn’t she?” Seskii gave Jeh a wink. “But she’s not here right now, instead it’s Vaughan.”

“Uh… yes,” Vaughan said, unsure what Seskii was getting at. “And the chair should be ready for another run, now.”

“Oh, can I watch?”

“Sure,” Vaughan said, dismissively.

“Uh, it would be kind of boring…” Jeh shuffled her feet nervously. “I mean, the chair just floats, it doesn’t go anywhere…”

Seskii put a hand on Jeh’s shoulder. “I’m sure you can do it.”

“Huh?”

“I believe in you, Jeh. You’ve got so much potential! You just need to relax and become one with the flow.”

“I’m not su—“

“Just be calm. Try it with me: breathe in, breathe out. Okay?”

Jeh decided to just go along with it and did as Seskii instructed, taking a few moments for slow, deep breaths. As she did so, her foot stopped tapping and she let her arms hang to her side.

“See? Now, just… go with it. And I’ll give you more juice once you’ve got it!”

Jeh had to admit, that juice was a pretty tempting prize. With a coy smirk, she climbed into the chair and set one hand on the Magenta interface and the other on her Orange chunk. Without even saying “ready” she turned the drive on and levitated herself a short distance into the air.

“You got this, Jeh!” Seskii called. “Remember, flow!”

Remember…

Jeh closed her eyes, shutting out any possible distraction; she wasn’t even aware if Vaughan had put up the blinding field or not. It didn’t matter—she had to go by feel, so she was going to go by feel. She would be one with the wind… one with the wind…

The first gust came, and she rode it without so much as a twitch.

“Good!” Seskii called. “Now, just keep doing that…”

The second gust came, stronger than the first, but instead of clenching, Jeh smiled and allowed the chair to twirl with the wind before she brought it to a stop. Perhaps fighting directly with overwhelming force simply wasn’t the answer…

“Yeah! You got this!”

Now that she was doing it, Jeh found it completely natural. She was no longer trying to punch the wind, she was with it. Something had just… clicked. Not that she knew what it was.

Vaughan unleashed the Blue-accelerated winds sooner than usual. They hit Jeh. Instead of trying to push back at them all at once, she waited—felt for the tilt of the chair to determine the singular direction she needed to push back. As it turned out, multiple winds tended to cancel the momentum of each other, meaning she’d always been overcompensating.

“Woohoo!” Seskii cheered.

Vaughan tried a Yellow connection, but Jeh was able to reject it without much thought. I really was focused too much on that.

“Huh…” Vaughan tapped his scepter on the ground. “That’s… enough, Jeh, you did it.”

“Yeah!” Jeh set the chair down and jumped out of it, doing a little dance all around that involved a lot of punching the air with her fists. “Who’s got it? I do! Jeh the legendary!”

Vaughan turned to Seskii. “What was in the juice you gave her?”

“Just juice.” Seskii grinned smugly. “All she really needed was some positive reinforcement.”

“…Bu—“

“Everyone learns differently. Plus, I know the Academy, and I kn—“

It was at this point all of them finally registered one of the roars—though this was only because they could also feel the intense shaking of the ground.

“What…?” Vaughan looked to the forest where the sound had come from and then to Jeh.

Jeh shrugged. “Never met anything that could do that in the forest.”

The roar happened again, this time much louder but without the quake. It was getting closer.

Vaughan held his scepter up high and took an aggressive posture. “Get behind me.” Seskii listened. Jeh merely stood at his side.

And then they waited.

As it turned out, whatever was making the racket was a long way off. However, each roar that came was louder than the last, making it painfully obvious that it was heading right for them.

“Jeh, hide the drive,” Vaughan ordered.

Jeh didn’t even consider complaining. She scrambled to the chair and, rather than removing the drive, picked up the entire haphazard apparatus and ran into the cabin with it. Deciding to keep the Orange chunk, she returned to the backyard at Vaughan’s side.

The roaring was getting closer and the trembles were getting more pronounced. The ground shuddered as though a minor earthquake were passing through, knocking a few Yellow tops off a nearby table.

Vaughan was ready. His scepter was already sparkling more than usual. Jeh had no idea what he intended to do, but she knew it was going to be impressive. The creature had to be close now: Jeh could hear trees creaking and branches snapping and… was that the clank clank of someone running in full armor?

Krays jumped out of the forest, sparkling with the energy of Blue magic. She looked and sounded terrible; her hair had numerous twigs stuck in it, she’d been cut in several places, and her breathing was so haggard it seemed unnatural—though she was accelerated so this was to be expected. She raised a finger as if to say something, but promptly tripped over a rock and landed face-first in the dirt.

Jeh used her Orange to pick up Krays and levitate her behind Vaughan. The trip was not a smooth one for the blue gari, but at least she wasn’t dragged unceremoniously along the ground.

“Krays, I know you’re tired, but what is it?” Vaughan asked.

“Plast… dragon…”

“What in Dia’s name is a plast dragon?”

There was another roar. With this one, a tree at the edge of Vaughan’s yard collapsed, revealing Darmosil, in full armor, embedded into the trunk of the tree as though he’d been launched into it like an arrow.

“Darmie!” Krays shouted, voice cracking and without a hint of her usual fire.

Vaughan grimaced, immediately using Green to restore whatever unpleasant injuries came to Darmosil from hitting a tree at that high of a velocity. When Jeh saw the five-eyed beast, she knew she needed to buy him some time.

“Whack!” Jeh shouted, using her Orange to pick up the blackboard and slap the plast dragon across the face with it. It turned to her with a fury in all of its eyes, opening its throat and hitting her dead-on with a roar. The sound carried through her entire body and pushed her back. She was light enough to go flying.

“Not today!” Jeh used the Orange on the air behind her, giving her enough of a windy push to land sturdily on her feet. Then she applied a crushing force on the plast dragon’s neck.

The creature let out a wail of pain from the sensation, but it acted quickly. Using the claws at the end of its wing, it reached onto one of the circular pores on the back of its neck and pulled out a Magenta crystal larger than Jeh’s head.

“No!” Vaughan stopped healing Damrosil immediately—the gari was audibly groaning in pain, now, he’d live. The wizard whipped his scepter out and pointed it at the plast dragon, forcing everything he could into it.

It was too late. The dragon’s Magenta crystal filled the entire area with appropriately colored sparkles. Every Colored crystal in the yard started flashing on and off randomly without executing any actual spells—this included Vaughan’s staff and the Orange Jeh was holding. Jeh found she couldn’t give the crystal any commands.

“It’s spirited!” Vaughan shouted. “Someone get Ripashi!”

“Way ahead of you!” Seskii shouted—she’d already started running to Willow Hollow proper.

“Watch out for its sound,” Krays said. “It…”

The beast had already begun to bellow, knocking both Vaughan and Krays to the side effortlessly. It turned back to its original prey, Darmosil. He was fine, but he’d lost his grip on his swords—swords that were now in Jeh’s hands.

Jeh tightened her grip on the blades, finding the sensation of holding them to be completely natural. Furthermore, they were still extremely hot, despite the current useless nature of their Red cores. With a wild battle cry, Jeh charged the plast dragon.

It roared right at her. She took it head-on, but without the Orange, she was unable to keep her footing this time and only kept hold of one sword. She didn’t particularly care. She swung her other sword around while still on the ground, embedding the blade into the plast dragon’s wing. With the heat, she easily punctured right through, but the plastic-like material melted around the blade, quickly lowering its temperature and hardening around it.

Jeh pulled on the sword, finding it to be stuck rather effectively within the plast dragon. She tried to yank again—but the plast dragon lifted its wing and Jeh came with it. Stubbornly refusing to let go of the blade, she kicked around wildly in a mild tantrum.

With the claws at the end of its free wing, it slashed at Jeh, cutting right through her bear furs.

“Hey, I work hard on those!” she shouted at the beast. It only narrowed its eyes in confusion at her continued state of living. The lights on its chest started cycling through many complicated patterns.

Jeh tried to swing herself forward to kick the beast, but it kept her lifted high. The only way she would get anywhere was if she let go of the sword, and she wasn’t about to do that.

Jeh sensed something change. It took her a moment to realize that the Magenta aura had just increased in intensity. She wondered what that meant.

The dragon clawed her.

For the first time in memory, Jeh saw the red of her own blood.

What!? she tried to say, but her words didn’t come. The next thing she knew she was falling. Then the massive foot of the plast dragon descended onto her chest.

~~~

“Are you okay?”

Blue looked up from the cup of tea she was having. “Just got an… ominous feeling.”

“That happens sometimes.” Her conversation partner was an old human woman knitting while she sat in a rocking chair on her porch. Her house was situated alone on the side of the road and the door had said “visitors welcome,” so Blue had decided to take a rest. “What kind of ominous, Blue?”

“Not sure. Doesn’t matter anyway, I’m not superstitious.”

The woman gave her a crooked smile. “Everyone’s a little superstitious, dearie. How can you not be in this world of ours?”

Blue shook her head. “Superstitions are beliefs in things like luck, omens, and other such things there is no evidence for.”

“No evidence… but are they impossible?”

“What mechanism would give me an ominous feeling that meant something?”

The old woman pursed her lips. “Well, there’s always attributes…”

“Attributes… are limited by design.”

“Isn’t that belief a superstition, in some ways?”

Blue turned to look at her tea, contemplative. “…To some, maybe. They just take it because they were told. Not to me.”

“It’s good to be confident.” The woman continued knitting. Blue was left to ponder in silence for a while.

“What even are attributes?” she mumbled to herself, using her own telekinetic attribute to levitate her teacup into the air. “Why can I even do this?”

“Hey, I’m just an old woman who likes to keep traveler’s company, I’m not the technical type.” She chuckled like a hyena for a few moments. “You tell me. As far as I know, it’s all a gift from Dia.”

Blue examined her teacup. She tilted her head to the side and her cup at the same angle, careful to stop just when the tea was about to fall out. “Everything still has a reason, a pattern, a limitation. Everything on Ikyu follows rules. Plants grow, things fall, air gets breathed, and… magic crystals develop.”

“Do you really need to know why?”

Blue set her teacup down and tapped her hoof against the table. “I… I’d like to, but I realize it’s too much for me to expect to figure out. Not going to stop me from trying though.”

The old woman grinned once more. “That’s the spirit.”

With a nod, Blue finished her drink. “This is good tea.” She stood up, using her tail to dust herself off. “But I should get back to Willow Hollow now. I am sorry I skipped this place when I was going the other way.”

“Don’t worry about it, not everyone wants the company of a crazy old woman.”

“You’re not crazy. Much.” Blue chuckled. “Bye!” Blue’s smile turned into a confused frown. “…I can’t believe this, I don’t believe I got your name?”

“It’s Agatha.”

“Right. Thanks! I’ll be sure to drop by next time I’m here!” She rushed out the door, galloping down the road to Willow Hollow.

“Maybe you’ll come back, maybe you won’t…” Agatha shook her head and chuckled. “So full of life, that one… I bet she could solve anything if she put her mind to it.”

~~~

Vaughan had no idea what to do.

He was a wizard. He solved problems with magic and flair.

This plast dragon had spat on that and removed it from him. All magic was scrambled, from the smallest crystal to the most advanced attribute.

Jeh… you… you were so brave it was stupid.

The plast dragon decided that Jeh was no longer a problem and returned to Darmosil, who was barely able to move.

Vaughan forced himself to his feet, ignoring the fact that he was missing one of his slippers. He raised his scepter… and had to stop to ask himself what he was doing. It was useless.

He was useless.

All he could do was watch as the plast dragon descended on Darmosil.

“CAW!”

A streak of Magenta light fell from the sky, embedding itself in the back of the beast’s neck. The plast dragon reared away from Darmosil and turned to the sky, releasing another roar. However, this roar was different—it lacked the strange reverberation and force the previous roars had. Furthermore, as the beast took a step, the ground no longer trembled.

“Such a hypocrite without a shred of honor!” Ripashi declared, descending from the sky in a pose that somehow managed to look manly and elegant while also allowing him to hold his bow taut with another anti-magic arrow within.

Bless Seskii and her speed, Vaughan thought as he let out a sigh of relief.

“You act like an animal!” Ripashi shouted. “So I shall treat you as such!”

The rippling colors in the plast dragon’s stomach became agitated. Evidentially, those weren’t magical, or the arrow was somehow unable to interrupt them. The dragon charged, opening its jagged maw wide to increase its chances of biting Ripashi in half.

Ripashi, however, had made it his job to hunt creatures. It was a simple matter for him to jump to the side and roll out of the way. Vaughan noticed he wasn’t flying anymore: naturally, if Jeh’s attribute were canceled, the qorvid’s would be as well at such close proximity.

Jeh…

Vaughan took one glance at Jeh and immediately regretted it, closing his eyes and looking away.

“All she really needed was some positive reinforcement.”

Seskii wasn’t even there anymore. Her gaze was much more intense in his memory than it ever was in truth.

“You deserve to have a bear dropped on you!” Ripashi shouted as he rolled around and littered the plast dragon with arrows—drawing a syrupy blue fluid from a few of the wounds. “If I had more time, you would get a bear dropped on you!”

Time…

Vaughan rushed Krays, who was currently trying to stand up and get back into the fray. Without saying anything, he ripped her pack off of her and opened it, finding lots of broken glass. No globe weapons he could use to buy time for Ripashi.

Wait…

Broken glass was useful.

“Yaaah!” Vaughan shouted, throwing the entire bag at the plast dragon. The force of the launch was enough to wrench his shoulder, but the bag sailed true, scattering bits of glass all over the beast and the ground it walked on. The next step it made was greeted by several shards of glass skewering its foot, prompting a wail of agony.

“Aaaand…” Ripashi let an arrow fly. The ordinary arrow hit the Magenta crystal dead on with enough force to tear it out of the plast dragon’s weakened grip. Immediately, the Magenta aura surrounding the yard vanished.

Vaughan wasted no time. He pointed his scepter right at Jeh, praying to Dia that she wasn’t too far gone—but he knew, deep down, that there was a point at which Green’s restoration failed. He knew that Jeh had more than crossed that point.

So his shock was paralyzing when he noticed Jeh regenerating without any assistance from him.

What is she!?

Jeh stood up. Her head, arms, and legs had been largely spared the onslaught of the plast dragon, but the rest of her was another story. Vaughan watched in fascination and horror as skin formed around the bones and then grew out like a balloon until Jeh’s body had returned to its normal volume. The bear furs hung in tatters around her, and Vaughan noticed a kind of black fabric with blueish highlights under it.

Jeh looked up to the plast dragon—and laughed. It wasn’t a menacing laugh, or a proud one, it was the laugh of a child who’d just found a new toy.

The plast dragon decided enough was enough. With a pained growl, it turned and ran back into the forest.

“One does not retreat, foul fiend! True men stand to the end!” Ripashi declared. He spread his wings, preparing to take to the sky now that his attribute was back.

“No!” Vaughan shouted. “That’s not an animal, Ripashi, you could be tried for that! Chasing is not self-defense!”

Ripashi stopped his flight a little too late, ending up face-first in the ground. “...The law is not honorable.”

“Agreed,” Darmosil managed, breathing heavily. “Vaughan… do you mind…?”

Vaughan wordlessly turned his Green back onto Darmosil, healing him the rest of the way. But he couldn’t stop looking at Jeh the whole time. She was currently glaring angrily at the tears in her furs.

“I’m going to have to find a new bear,” she sighed. “Ripashi, got any leftover furs?”

“Plenty!” Ripashi declared.

“Great. I need some.”

“Why not wear normal clothes?” Vaughan asked.

“That…” Krays spoke up, still breathing haggardly. “Is a silly idea… She’s not a normal kid, Vaughan.”

“No…” Vaughan turned to her, frowning. “No, she’s not. No attribute should be able to function like that.”

“I’m impossible!” Jeh declared.

“Yes, you are.” Vaughan kneeled down so he was closer to Jeh’s height and put a hand on her shoulder. “Jeh… there are very few rules to attributes, but they are concrete. You just broke one of them.”

“Eh?”

“On death, all attributes cease functioning.”

“Pff, I can’t die.”

“All magic was blocked, Jeh. You couldn’t regenerate. I…” Positive reinforcement. Vaughan forced a smile. “You’re… amazing. Amazingly impossible!”

“Sweet!” Jeh gave a fist-pump. “Bet you’re glad you found me, huh?”

“You… have no idea,” Vaughan said. What am I even supposed to say here?

Krays saved him from having to think of anything. “Does anyone… know what that creature was?”

Ripashi shook his head. “I have never seen a plast that large. And I was not aware there were spirited plasts in this region.”

Vaughan shook his head. “I’ve never seen anything of that sort.”

“Well that’s just… peachy.” Krays’ frown deepened. “You think there are more?”

“There’s no such thing as a unique entity,” Vaughan said. “Every person is a member of a race, even the Crystalline Ones. There are…” he glanced to Jeh. “No exceptions...”

Jeh shrugged. “I don’t have any answers for you. Sorry.”

“It’s… okay,” Vaughan said. “…Since you’ve flown the chair well today and fought a plast dragon, you’re free to do whatever you want.”

Jeh clapped her hands together. “Yes! Ripashi, let’s go get that bearskin!”

“…I am sorry, Jeh, you will have to go without me—Suro will know where it is and what it costs.” He kneeled to the ground, examining the purple fluid that had leaked from the plast dragon. “I will be tracking this thing as best I can, try to find out where it came from.”

Vaughan shook his head. “Ripashi…”

“I will form a search party! We need to capture it and bring it in for judgment! That has to be the beast that’s been taking all the cows—it must answer for its crimes!”

“Count… me in…” Krays said.

Ripashi raised an eyebrow. “Krays, yo—“

Krays punched Vaughan in the gut, making use of his shock to reach into his robe and pull out some Green which she used to heal herself. The rate of healing was decidedly slow, but enough for her to get her voice back. “I’m going.”

“I… will get some more suitable weapons…” Darmosil said. “As well as some armor that’s not thrashed.”

Vaughan nodded slowly. “I…”

“Should stay here,” Ripashi declared. “I expect it to have more than one Magenta crystal.”

“Right.” Slumping, Vaughan walked over to one of his chairs that had been blown over, stood it up, and sat down. He sighed. “Right…”

“I’ll be back soon!” Jeh called as she ran off into town. Everyone else left as well, discussing who else to invite to their little expedition.

Vaughan was left alone, staring at the bloody spot where Jeh had been only minutes before.

“Suro always joked that this looked like a battlefield…”

~~~

Blue didn’t return to the cabin until the sun had long since set. She was looking forward to a nice nap in her bed. Unfortunately, just because she was tired didn’t mean she was suddenly utterly oblivious. When she tried to unlock the front door, she found that it was already unlocked.

Vaughan must have forgotten to lock it. With a sigh, she went inside and locked the door behind her. She ascended the stairs, intending to give him a mouthful about locking doors assuming he wasn’t already asleep. Chances were he was on that telescope of his…

But she found no Vaughan in the attic, and he wasn’t in his room sleeping either. Looking outside, she found Jeh curled up and asleep in a nearby tree.

Only then did she see Vaughan sitting in the backyard, staring at a dark spot in the ground.

With a frown, Blue descended the stairs and came out the cabin’s back door. “Vaughan?”

“Jeh sure is good at regenerating,” Vaughan said, empty.

“…I mean, yes, we suffocated her basically to death and she was completely fine. I…” Blue realized for the first time that the area Vaughan was looking at was blood red. “…What in Eights happened here?”

“We were attacked by some kind of plast creature. It was spirited, jammed everything with Magenta. Utterly demolished her. Her regeneration restarted the moment Ripashi disarmed the monster.”

“That’s… impossible,” Blue said. “I…” she glanced up the tree at Jeh, sleeping soundly in its branches. “Attributes…”

“There are rules, Blue. She broke them. Do you know what that means!?” Vaughan stood up violently, eyes wild.

Blue looked Vaughan in the eyes, seeing the fear in them. She folded her ears back—but smiled. “It means she’s still here.”

“I—“

“Isn’t… that enough, Vaughan?” Blue looked up the tree at Jeh. “I’d love to know why she is and what she is, but I also like to know who she is. And she’s a wonderful, curious, impulsive, eager kid. In the end, I think that’s the part that should matter the most.”

Vaughan sat back down, sagging. “She finally got the test chair to float properly with the real drive and everything. No thanks to me.”

“I’m sure y—“

“I was unfair to her. I taught her as I was taught.” He put his hand to the bridge of his nose. “What was I thinking?”

“Clearly you got past that.”

“Not really, Seskii came in and kind of did it for me.”

Blue decided now was not the time to comment on the potion seller. “At least… uh…” Blue shuffled her hooves awkwardly. “I… okay look I have no idea. Okay?”

Vaughan looked at her in mild confusion.

“I… I’m trying to be wise and all understanding over here but I don’t know. I don’t know you.”

“I thought I was a moron?”

“That’s what you are, who are you?” Blue blinked a few times. “Why am I even asking? I just…” She held a hoof in the air and rotated it in a circle. “You shouldn’t be like this.”

Vaughan nodded. “I know. I’ve been around long enough to… visit here, a few times.” He closed his eyes and tilted his head back. “Remind me to tell you about Tempest sometime.”

Blue bit her lip. She felt as though the moment she said something everything would come collapsing around her and that she’d been a fool to try to say anything at all.

“…We found her the day I decided I wanted to ‘go up.’ She saved my life.” Vaughan frowned. “I’d forgotten about that. I wouldn’t be here if she hadn’t been there at the perfect time. What is that?”

Blue held up a hoof in the equine equivalent of a shrug. “…Dia’s gift?”

“Heh…” Vaughan couldn’t help but smile at that. “How unlike you, Blue. Where’d you get that?”

“Just… felt right to say, I guess.” She smiled warmly. “We don’t have time to try to answer everything.”

“Not going to stop me from trying.”

“Never for a moment did I think I would cure your chronic stupidity with a conversation.”

“You share my disease.”

“Eh… yeah.” Blue let out a long whinny. “Vaughan, what are we doing?”

Vaughan shrugged, offering no vocal response. He turned his gaze to the sky and the brilliance of the full moon.

“…That’s as good of an answer as any, I suppose.”

~~~

Ripashi led about a dozen people from Willow Hollow into the forest. Most of them came with farming implements rather than actual weapons, but Ripashi was still thankful for the extra manpower—and the torches. Qorvids had a bad history with open flames.

It was not hard to follow the gooey trail of purple fluid. However, at some point the beast must have removed the anti-magic arrows, since it had taken flight and stopped destroying branches by moving.

However, even flying, it couldn’t stop the bleeding. It just took some time for Ripashi to track it effectively.

In the end, it was the middle of the night when they ended their journey. They found a plast tree that was green in color where bark should have been, but the spherical nodules that took the place of its leaves were brown. It had precisely five branches and was utterly covered in bones of cows, deer, bears, and other large game.

There was also a dead plast dragon at the base of the tree, no more lights in its chest.

“…Did the thing go and die of its wounds!?” Krays asked. “That’s not fair!”

Ripashi flew over to inspect the remnant, motioning that someone should shine torchlight on it. Once the flames drew near, it was clear the plast dragon hadn’t succumbed to Ripashi’s arrows. Its neck was cut through by large claws; specifically, the kind of claws on its own wings.

It couldn’t have taken its own life, though, the wing couldn’t possibly reach the neck and scratch that deeply at that angle.

It had to have been another plast dragon.

“There’s another one, stay alert!” Ripashi loaded an anti-magic arrow into his bow and pointed to the sky. Everyone else took similarly aggressive postures, ready for anything to come flying at them.

Nothing came.

“…Hey, found something,” Darmosil said, lifting up a stone tablet with some letters scrawled into it. “It’s in Karli, though very rough.”

“Well, what’s it say?” Krays asked.

“You win the game. He lost.” Darmosil lowered the stone tablet. “That’s all it says.”

Ripashi lowered his bow. “…That other plast dragon is long gone.”

“It could be a trick…” Krays said.

“It is no trick. Come. Let’s go home and hope we never get involved in another one of these… ‘games.’ “

~~~

SCIENCE SEGMENT

This was more of a magic chapter than a science one, but there is a single moment we can look at. When Jeh figures out what to do with the multiple gusts of wind. What’s happening here is a common problem in physics: trying to balance forces.

Say there is an object (Jeh in a chair) that has only three forces acting on it. These three forces are bursts of wind coming at different angles. In theory, gravity and the drive are also forces acting on this, but in a perfect situation they cancel each other out.

It is always possible to model situations like this as a single force pushing one direction rather than three forces–it helps to simplify a lot of things when solving problems. However, the combined force is not three times as powerful as the original forces. This is because they push in different directions. If two identical forces pushed at opposite directions, the net effect is zero (which is how the drive counteracts gravity: it pushes exactly against it). So some of the gusts of wind are interfering destructively and lessen the net force. If two forces point the same direction they add completely, but if they point different directions they will be less. The exact relation involves the angle between them and some trigonometry, but I won’t bore you with the math.

So when all the wind forces are added together, we get a single force that isn’t as strong as all three put together. That is the force Jeh had to counteract with her manual magic, and she was a bit too headstrong to realize that she was pushing way too hard.

This is the driving idea behind vector addition.