I’d argue that only two types of people create spells. The first is the wise, who use prudence and research to develop their spell. The other is the fool who isn’t aware enough to be afraid. They rely on ignorance and luck to achieve their goal.

~Gwyddion, God of Illusions

Beast Aspect filled his mind and took all his focus as he worked tirelessly on comprehension. Using charred wood like a pencil, he wrote patterns and calculations on the wall while observing the beast core. These were things he could do in his mind, but the act of drawing gave him more insight than visualizing. If he had to guess, the Truths acted on or against his actions. It required his understanding of those Truths, but that subconscious feeling wasn’t something he could sense within his mind.

The vestige held hundreds of Celtic Knots categorized by beast types. But these were only usable on commonly found beast cores which a Silver-Eyed Crow was not. He had only seen hand-drawn images of one in books, but even that was speculation. Their sensitivity to karma allowed them to avoid people and beasts, so they remained elusive and mysterious. That meant the core in his hand was beyond priceless. No amount of gold or Mana Crystals could purchase something like this.

Regardless, the Knots in the vestige provided a template for several bird-type beasts he could modify for his purposes. The only things he needed to recalculate for were the beast’s abilities, size, and bloodline. Thankfully, all those details were also provided by Mugna. That old man had prepared this gift well. As long as Crow followed the instructions left behind, he could easily create the pattern. He had already completed three acceptable versions but tossed them. Instead, he reread the passage on bird-type beasts, feeling a strange reluctance to use this spell.

Beast Aspect was amazing, but it felt wrong for him. The nagging thought in his mind was that if he used this spell as is, he’d lose a good portion of his strength. Ghosting was his most powerful spell, and it had so many growth trees. The Ghostly Aura was really the true treasure of that spell, and the rest of the branchings were just distractions. Meditating over the various Ghosting aspects, he realized why he was reluctant. Beast Aspect was also a type of aura, so the two were in conflict.

A few days later, he realized why Beast Aspect gave him a nagging sense of familiarity. Myriad of the Dead’s first spell was Faces of Death, and Beast Aspect was similar—eerily similar. Following that train of thought, he could argue that a core was the soul of a beast. Comparing the two spells, he started marking the overlapping Knot formations and realized they were even closer than he thought.

The problem was he didn’t want it to be built on Ghostly Aura. An unreasonable thought came to mind, and that was he felt this was his first genuine Druid spell. That wasn’t true because Ghosting and its various aspects were very much Druid spells and even relied on Druid cultivation to use. Even the spell patterns were Celtic Knots, but he couldn’t let go of what he felt was his original path and his affinity toward Wood Mana. Beast Aspect made him feel like a Druid, and although Druids leaned toward a priest-like disposition in their approach, the spirit-based spells made him feel more like a Shaman. There was nothing wrong with that, but from his perspective, Druids leaned toward being hunters of beasts and knowledge.

In his mind, changing the spell was fine as long as it continued to conform to Druid cultivation. Maybe he was selfish, but Beast Aspect could be considered the most distinctive spell of the Draoidh, and it wasn’t something he would allow outsiders to use.

If they were smart enough to discover how to create the spell on their own, then that was their fate, and Crow would have no issues with that. Pacing the small room, Crow spent another three days planning out the spell and settled on calling it the Myriad of Beasts.

He pursued this idea because of the limitations imposed by Beast Aspect. The biggest was that in the history of the spell, only rare geniuses could master three beast forms. The practitioner’s Body and the permanence of the changes caused by the beast cores pushed the limit of what they could assimilate. The physiological changes were too drastic among the beast types, so Druids would choose only one land beast and was usually the second choice. The first choice for most was a bird-type beast, and if they got a third choice, it was usually a water-based beast.

Crow felt that was a terrible loss of utility. With Myriad of the Dead as a model, he could reform it to break past that limit. There was a tradeoff that limited the physiological permanence to one beast-type. That wasn’t all bad, as he could keep adding different bird-type cores to it and making his original aspect even more powerful. On top of that, as long as his Soul could handle it, he could add one core for each beast-type. He didn’t know why it was limited in that way but assumed it had to do with integrating a single beast core into his Body. Those secondary beast forms didn’t give his Body any boosts but gave him way more utility than Beast Aspect. Adding a fish-type beast core to the Myriad wouldn’t increase his agility but would allow him to breathe underwater while transformed.

More than that, the Myriad of Beasts currently only had one stage: Beast Transformation. Myriad of the Dead had a series of spells that he could use as the starting point for Myriad of Beasts’ future phases.

There was another option: he could give up the passive gains to his Body. In other words, he could sacrifice the physiological permanence associated with assimilating a beast into his Body. This would allow him to add as many beast cores into the Myriad as he’d like, with the only restriction being his Soul. Even this wasn’t so bad because this method put less strain on the Soul. He’d also gain a temporary boost to his Body based on the transformation—it was limited by the core and his cultivation.

The major downside was that he couldn’t combine similar beast-type cores to continue the permanent passive growth of his Body. It was this downside that Crow couldn’t get past and felt it was the wrong path for him. However, he admitted this method was closer to Myriad of the Dead’s structure.

And a major factor he had put little focus on was that Myriad of the Dead had several related spells he could convert.

Crow finally settled on the first option because he felt the passive boosts to his Body and the growth potential weren’t something he wanted to pass on. Another reason was that he thought about his conversation with Dagda a few years ago. The man hinted that his allies all represented a type of beast, and if Crow taught his wives this spell, how powerful would their growth become. He’d prefer they focused on a specific development that suited them rather than gaining so much versatility that they excelled at none of them.

Now that he had a goal, he continued developing and redesigning the spell. It took almost a week to go through hundreds of iterations. The only reason he could do any of this was because of Gavin’s tutelage. And he still remembered to exercise every morning, which he’d do by running the perimeter of the valley several times. The nymphs were always messing with him, and he laughed at their playful nature.

Today was the day he realized the flaw, or oversight, in his spell. It was the aura. Beast Aspect sort of incorporated that in, and if he built Myriad of Beasts like the second option he thought up, it wouldn’t be an issue either. However, he created a foundational spell that required an aura called the Bestial Aura.

The Bestial Aura also gave him ideas on transitioning the Myriad of the Dead spells over. Deathly Appearance was a mental attack that tricked people into thinking he was dead. Or maybe an illusion spell was more accurate. So Bestial Appearance would work similarly in that he could imbue his attacks with the ferocity of the cores in his Myriad. In his mind, he pictured a simple sword attack feeling as if the might of a bear’s paw was crashing down on his opponent.

The third phase of the Myriad of the Dead, which was the exact name of the phase, used his opponent’s fear against them. This was a legit mental attack and above Crow’s current ability. But he called the converted spell concept the Attack of the Myriad, and it would work similarly. The only restriction was that Crow’s attack was limited to the cores he incorporated into the Myriad. This meant it would use the animal within his Myriad that his opponent feared the most. Crow didn’t mind because there should be plenty of beasts within his Myriad by the time he could use it.

Those spells didn’t exist yet and were mostly thought experiments for now. Still, Crow noted them down for research later. People were waiting for him, and he needed to escape this place. During those refining stages, he realized an issue he couldn’t ignore. He built bestial Aura on the Celtic Knot design he used to construct the Ghostly Aura, which prevented him from activating both at the same time. No, the real problem was no aura was compatible because they used the same nodes within his body. Which meant he’d lose a significant part of his strength while using Bestial Aura, and that wasn’t an acceptable trade.

A few days of pondering the problem brought him no closer to a solution. It was the nymphs that inspired him and gave him the kick he needed. They coexisted with their trees, which meant they were a multidimensional existence. A symbiotic binding using the tree’s heart as the link between the two.

What Crow needed to do was define the tree’s heart, or in this case, the core pattern of an aura. Creating a binding between two auras shouldn’t be a problem if the core pattern was the same between the two. As he was developing both using the same structures, that shouldn’t be an issue. However, he knew his current knowledge limited his thought process. In other words, the idea he came up with would only allow him to combine two auras together. If he developed a third aura in the future, he’d have to choose which two to activate.

The limitation was that his understanding of multidimensional arrays and knots was low. If the core pattern of his auras was a flat plane inside his body, then the specific auras like Bestial and Ghostly would connect to the right and left sides of it. It took him less than a day to tweak the auras using the similarities between the two and extract the features that were unique to each aura. And then spent the next day smoothing the synergy between the two to economize his mana usage. Running two auras without that synergy drained his mana three times faster because of their disharmony. He cut that mana usage in half by using the core pattern to power the other two.

Overall, it went smoother than expected. Crow didn’t even need to change the Ghosting spells to accommodate the new Ghostly Aura because the connection points remained the same. The Bestial Aura didn’t increase the power of the Ghosting spells, as that wasn’t the intention, but it added another dimension.

In simple terms, he could use his Ghosting ability in human or beast form. This was the best probable outcome, in his opinion. If he had another aura later, he could potentially choose which two auras to activate. Also, the physiological changes caused by assimilating the Silver-Eyed Crow would be permanent and passive, so those changes weren’t considered part of the aura. Even if he didn’t use Bestial Aura, he’d have the increased Body benefits.

“Shew,” Crow blew out a shaky breath. He’d neglected food and sleep to finish the patterns necessary for the aura because he was afraid he’d lose his train of thought. Only now did he’d massively depleted his mana to maintain his body’s energy and nutrition.

It was dark out, which was obvious because of the oppressive nature he felt from the Scath. So he made a quick meal and slept the night away. There was only one step left in creating his Myriad of Beasts spell—assimilate the beast core. It was something he didn’t want to do in his current state.