The soulseed itself, be it a Seed, Sprout, Bud or Flower, represents some sort of shape or mould for a Conceptual ability to form. Every cultigen describes having to “push” Sunlight into their soulseed to use their unique abilities. Which segues into the next point, Conceptual abilities.

Conceptual abilities are unique, but the Concepts themselves are not. Two cultigens on the For Dummies staff have a Bud of Effervescence, for example, but one is able to make solid objects boil away into thin air, while another has the ability to imbue a group of people with essentially infinite stamina and multiple times their normal strength and mental acuity (very useful during those late hours, thanks Fitz).

Strangely enough, there seems to be a familial component with manifestations. While anyone can theoretically manifest and not every child of a cultigen will manifest, 80% of cultigens today have one or more parents with soulseeds themselves. This indicates a strong correlation between manifesting and a family history of manifestations, but studies on whether this is nature or nurture have given conflicting results.

Interestingly, Elvans born on Earth and humans born on Ega do not manifest, despite cultigens from either planet being able to power themselves with the Sun on either planet. No one knows why as of yet.

Excerpt from “Concepts for Dummies”

Musa lay awake in his bed, staring at the ceiling. He did that a lot lately. His studies were going well, better than ever in fact, school and training the only things he could find motivation for these days. Making it into the Guild proper was his only chance. I’ll find you.

As it turned out, Freja and her team had also bloomed during the ill-fated delve, putting them and Musa in the enviable position of being the only first-year Sprouts. The two other members of her team had been temporarily withdrawn from the Academy however, their parents worried about more attacks, so he and Freja were forced together often.

Jas poked his head into Musa’s room, as he so often did.

“Friend Musa, shall we leave? Our class will commence shortly.”

Musa turned his head towards the man, giving him a flat look before speaking.

“You know, you don’t have to speak all flowery when its just us, Jas. This is your home, there’s no one else around to hear you.”

Jas was visibly taken aback. He stepped fully into the room, picking a path through the discarded laundry and empty food wrappers, and came to sit on the end of Musa’s bed.

“Sure, if it would make you more comfortable. I always figured you preferred me like that, you never asked me to stop when Mike was alive.”

A spike of pain lanced through Musa’s heart. Ah yes, the famous Jas bluntness.

“He’s not dead.”

“You watched him turn into motes of ligh-“

“He’s NOT FUCKING DEAD, JAS.”

“Whoa, okay, I guess we won’t talk about this today.”

Musa had told the Chancellor what he had seen and she had given assurances that she’d do everything in her power to return his friend. But a week later she’d told him that they were unable to find him, and they’d allegedly somehow searched the whole planet. She did say that this didn’t necessarily mean he was dead as even those that could see the recently departed couldn’t find him, but Jas and Birgitte had taken it as something she said to comfort him. There was just no reason the elves would have taken him. Jas and Musa had argued over this particular point frequently.

“Not today. Sorry for shouting, I’m all over the place recently.”

“Believe me, it’s fine. You acting normally gets me more worried because I know what’s happening under the surface. Never be afraid to tell me what you really think, about anything. Even if I think you’re wrong, I’ll hear you out.”

Musa disagreed. It’s not your fault, but you don’t know the half of it. He hid the fact that the world had gone monochrome ever since that day. Jas and Birgitte thought his smiles were just rarer than usual. Truthfully, they’d disappeared entirely, but the only person who knew him well enough to notice the slight strain behind every grin, the falsehood behind every flash of his dimples, was missing.

He grinned, dimples flashing.

“I appreciate that, Jas. I’m totally naked under this blanket so unless you’re comfortable with questioning why my body gives you tingles in your belly, let me go take a quick shower and put on some clothes.”

Jas laughed and gave Musa a huge smile back.

“Okay friend. I see your sense of humour hasn’t dulled at least. I’ll wait outside.”

Mike would’ve kept it going.

He had picked up the bad habit of comparing everyone in his life to Mike. It was unhealthy but he couldn’t help it.

Jas left the room and Musa’s face went blank again. He stared up at the ceiling for a few more seconds, then got up. It was showtime.

~~~~

“You may all get a chance to see an Aberrant firsthand soon, though from a distance of course.”

The multi-purpose hall went silent. The entire class, reduced as it was, was stunned at Mr McLeod’s statement. Then everyone started speaking at once, voices merging into an unintelligible din.

He sighed, and released his red mist, his power stopping the students from moving their jaws.

“As I was saying, we’ve gotten precognitive warnings that a young Class-Two is going to attack New London in about a week or so. It won’t get past the Bulwark, but we need to take it out regardless. The third-years have been tasked with this, with me and a few other staff members to supervise. However, I’ll allow you to tag along and watch. Maybe you’ll learn something. Anyway, that’s a week off. Find your sparring partner. You know what to do.”

He released the students from his hold and walked off. He reached the door, heedless of the students’ questions and disappeared through it. Enigmatic as ever.

Aberrants were what happened when a motile plant, a plant capable of movement, was lucky enough to survive a hotspot and become a Drasil. They didn’t form conventional Burrows, instead funnelling its Sunlight into improving its motile function, turning them into gigantic behemoths of hostile, moving vegetation. Class-Ones were technically not Drasils, they were the spawn of a sub group of Class-Twos that produced mobile seeds and tended to move in groups. Class-Twos were Drasils that moved themselves or spawned Class-Ones. Class-Threes were the really dangerous ones, the carnivorous plants. The few there were all had names, as they were strong enough to go toe-to-toe with a battalion of Flowers and smart enough to escape with their lives if they got too damaged. Dagon was the only Class-Four.

Ever since the advent of the Grapevine, people had watched Aberrant attacks online, whether on a TV or their personal computers and they were all intimately familiar with how dangerous even Class-Ones could be. There were countless videos of Aberrants annihilating settlements all over the world. So everyone was understandably concerned when Mr McLeod informed them of the imminent attack.

Musa looked around for Freja, his partner by default, and called her over from the other side of the crowd.

“Musa, we HAVE to go all out today! What if we’re needed to help against the Aberrant! Surely we're rusty by now.”

Musa was a bit startled at her energy, but he understood her excitement. The only problem was, whenever they decided to fight using their Sprouts, the class turned into an arena. Every other student would stop and watch their fight. Mr McLeod allowed it as long as they didn’t do it too often. Some even started betting, as she could actually win when he pulled out an ill-suited weapon or sometimes no weapon at all. Once, he even pulled out a stuffed teddy bear that made everyone burst out into tears and hug their neighbours. It was the only time he’d seen Mr McLeod truly laugh.

“Uhh, whoa there Cannon, don’t you think we’d be better off training up weapons since there’s no way we’re getting near that thing. We probably going to watch from the top of the Bulwark, it’ll be too far anyway.”

She stuck her tongue out at him.

“That’s boring, you always beat me when we’re not using our Sprouts. And stop calling me that.”

He’d started calling her Cannon on account of the ridiculous amount of pure destructive force her Concept, Detonation, could put out. Without his battle sense, he’d never win against her barrage of explosions.

Musa thought about it. It was tempting, they hadn’t had a proper spar in a few weeks. And this was the perfect day for it. It was noon, the Sun was shining brightly and there wasn’t a cloud in the sky. Why not? Let it not be said that the fear of a loss ever stopped Musa Mirzadeh.

He gave a confident smirk, playing his role perfectly.

“Fine then, you’re on missy. I’ll try to be gentlemanly about your defeat.”

She gave her own smirk back, looking up at him in defiance.

“Pride goeth before destruction, and a haughty spirit before a fall.”

Musa laughed.

“Bible verses? Are you also going to start wearing animal skins and speaking in grunts? If you want to do ancient history, go all in or don’t bother.”

They started walking out into the centre of the hall, the Sunlight already washing throughout the large, open topped gymnasium. The rest of the students started whispering behind them.

“You wish you could have me grunting, you little perv.”

“I’ll have to settle for you panting on the floor beneath me in a few minutes.” He responded with a grin.

“Oh fuck you, now its on.” She laughed as she lightly punched his shoulder.

He enjoyed flirting with the tall blonde, and she could give as good as she got. He just wished he’d met her before Mike disappeared.

Jas had started taking bets in the crowd that had formed near the wall. They wanted to see the action but had learned to stay far away from Freja when she fought seriously.

The pair squared up, waiting for the other to make the first move. Freja had her wand out and game face on, while Musa was standing with his hands clasped behind his back, confident smirk mocking.

His enhanced ears could make out the sound of people asking Jas the odds on the battle, the perceptive elf being exceptional at guessing the power level of his Remembrance tools. Guess I should give the people what they want.

He flooded his Sprout with Sunlight, a pale, spoiled looking brunette woman appearing next to him. She was wearing pink silken gloves with lacy cuffs that she took off and gave to him. Everyone else only saw him pull one frilly glove, then another onto his hands out of thin air. Freja lost her serious stance and started laughing.

“You can’t be serious.” She could barely speak through her mirth.

“Think of this as extra motivation. Do you really want to lose to the guy with pink lady’s gloves on?”

The jab lost its power as they could both hear Jas completely changing the odds, Freja now the overwhelming favourite to win. Oh ye of little faith, now I have to beat her.

He put his fists up in a boxer’s stance and imbued the gloves with Remembrance.

Two massive spectral gauntlets materialised in front of him, each the size of an elephant. The crowd gasped as they took them in. Each was dark and menacing, spikes on the knuckles, fingers sharpened to claws and some sort of draconic dinosaur engraved on the backs of the large, black, cartoonishly evil-looking gauntlets. Musa internally exulted. Yessss!

Freja had wasted no time, her wand glowing with a brilliant orange-yellow energy and pointed directly at him.

The ground all around him started glowing and the woman he’d summoned, in a high, feminine sounding voice, warned him to move. He tensed his legs and exploded off the ground, shooting off towards the tall blonde, just before the floor behind him actually exploded with an ear-splitting boom.

She wasn’t done though, as the ground between her and the rapidly closing in Musa started glowing as well. He dodged off to the side, abandoning his approach, before the landmines of energy could blow him apart. The combined pressure from the explosions threw him towards the crowd, his Sprout drinking in the Sunlight and repairing his already twice-blown eardrums.

The ghostly gauntlets had floated in front of him the whole time, mirroring the motion of his actual hands. He glanced at Freja, a confident smirk reminiscent of his own upon her face. I can’t let her just fry me from a distance. Let’s try something.

He raised his arms, willing the deadly metal gloves higher and higher, and brought them down in an overhead smash. The gauntlets sped downwards towards her, neither of them knowing whether anything would actually happen, but Freja not being willing to risk it. She dodged backwards and lucky she did, because they slammed into the ground with a mighty crack, spiderwebbing the reinforced concrete and shaking her off balance. I can work with this.

Musa didn’t waste the initiative, swiping at the ground with his fingers, while the massive claws tore through the concrete with barely any resistance in tandem with his motions. Freja couldn’t stay in one place as the huge gauntlets ripped through the floor in front of her repeatedly, always just barely missing her before she was forced to dodge again. The crowd had split in two, each half supporting one of the duellists.

Musa kept the relentless pressure up, grabbing at her, gouging at her, at one point leaving four man-sized holes in the ground by punching straight down with his knuckle spikes. Something had to change else she would lose handily and they both knew it.

Freja pulled a pistol from the small of her back, and it instantly lit up with an orange-yellow glow. Dammit.

She shot the gauntlets at close range. The empowered, shining bullets hit the translucent hands and blew them completely apart in a huge ball of Sunfire, thick sheets of transparent metal dissipating soon after they were ripped from their form. She was unaffected, immune to her own explosions, so she turned to him.

Block.

Musa immediately crossed his hands in front of his face, frantically imbuing the gloves again. The gauntlets reformed, shielding his body, just as bullets drilled into them, each projectile exploding spectacularly. The combined blasts so close to him tossed his body backwards, the harrowed man tumbling through the air as he desperately tried to get his bearings. He knew that the further a Detonation was from Freja, the more Sunlight it took out of her, unless she used her wand. But the wand was too slow. This would be ideal, except for the fact that forming the gauntlets took a lot out of him as well. He needed to finish this.

Musa tried something else as he landed on the grey floor. He empowered the gloves once more, hands splayed out on the floor. The gauntlets appeared in front of him, dwarfing his entire body.

He stuffed more Sunlight into his Sprout, filling the gloves up even more. The gauntlets lost their transparency, and he could feel a weight to his hands. He pushed down towards the ground and started rising into the air, buoyed by the force the gauntlets were now exerting on his form. A true smile peeked out on his face. Haha, this is such bullshit, she’ll hate this.

Freja loudly complained.

“Oh come on, that’s such bullshit!”

Half the crowd agreed as they started booing Musa, unable to drown out the cheers of his supporters who’d gone ecstatic at seeing him start to levitate.

He shot a grin off at his haters, and started walking on his hands, easily manoeuvring out the way of any bullets she sent towards him and having the time of his life moving around in the air. He sped up, the ground-shaking thumps of his gauntlets hitting the concrete providing an accelerating countdown to her defeat. She shot at the massive makeshift stilts, but Musa simply raised his hands out of the way, his Sprout level reflexes able to dodge the pellets of hot, glowing lead thanks to the gauntlets responding much faster now. They were like actual extensions of his arms.

His powerful opponent seemed to realise that her time was up, and seemed to come to a decision. She pulled a short metal cylinder out of her back pocket. Oh no.

She imbued the cylinder, turning it bright and luminescent, and a short flaming chain popped out the end of it. A spiked ball of pure orange-yellow energy, almost blinding to look at, materialised on the end of the chain, and she started spinning the flail, sprinting towards him faster than any normal human could dream.

This was her finishing weapon. Either she won in the next few seconds or she collapsed, her Sprout completely tapped out.

Musa turned to start running, fully intending on waiting her out, having been beaten by this particular tactic too often not to be cautious around the ridiculously strong woman running towards him.

She didn’t let him get away.

Cover.

He looked down and saw his gauntlets, currently stomping away at speed from her, illuminate as the chain extended and the spiked ball of energy approached the ground underneath him. He instantly dismissed his weapons, starting to fall out of the sky, and cupped his hands together, dumping as much Sunlight as he could into his Sprout. His massive gauntlets reformed around him with a loud clang, cocooning him in a dark metal shell, when the world went white.

A chest-rattling BOOM rang out outside his makeshift bubble, the pressure waves rupturing his internal organs and perforating one of his eyes. He kept his hands cupped, not daring to release them. He could feel himself rising and rising, the clasped gauntlets keeping howling wind outside at bay. He reached a peak and released his hands.

He was high enough to see the entirety of New London. The Sun bathed him in light, healing his many wounds and adding some much needed Sunlight to his dwindling reserves. Coughing up blood, he looked down and could barely see the rest of his classmates, even with his enhanced eyesight. The wind roared in his ears. There was a gigantic smoking crater in the centre of the hall, spanning half the entire width of the large gymnasium. The blast had torn up the reinforced concrete like it was common dirt. He wondered how the crowd had fared.

As he started dropping, he started sucking in Sunlight like his life depended on it. A few glowing bullets zipped around him, missing, but coming way too close for the range she was shooting from. How is she not empty? That usually takes her out of the fight too.

Musa increased his efforts, pushing his soul to its limit in his attempts to draw in every last bit of rejuvenating energy while he still could. He needed power for what he was about to try.

He reformed his gauntlets underneath him as he fell out of the sky, a few metres ahead of him to protect from any exploding projectiles. This was fortuitous as they exploded a second later, more empowered bullets slamming into the dark metal. He was forced to expend precious energy constantly reforming the gauntlets as she kept on destroying them.

He fell faster and faster, and tried his wild plan. He dismissed one of the gauntlets and diverted the power into just one glove. The remaining gauntlet immediately felt much more solid than any other he’d formed. He splayed out his hand and pushed Sunlight into his hardworking Sprout. The gauntlet started getting bigger.

He was close enough to see the students now, far below him. Someone, probably Birgitte, had produced a wall of sandbags that they were all huddled behind. As he watched, one sandbag after another popped into existence and joined the wall. He looked around and could see a few students from other classes outside looking up at him and his rapidly descending, rapidly enlarging metal hand.

He turned the gauntlet translucent, seeing Freja desperately shooting at the falling hand, but the bullets weren’t enough anymore. She took the metal cylinder out of her pocket again. You’re fucking kidding me.

She formed the glowing flail and started spinning it once more. Musa, much less confident about his victory now, shoved even more Remembrance into the glove.

The already massive gauntlet suddenly doubled in size, now spanning nearly the entire width of the hall. It looked like the hand of an enraged metal deity, blocking out the Sun itself, coming down to smite them all.

Freja released the chain and the flail, brighter than he’d ever seen it before, shot up to meet the hand.