Sachihiro

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Having redrawn the sigil I activate it, my consciousness is suddenly aware in my spirit-body. I check for any immediate danger finding none, the weapons that had formed of spirit into a hand-axe and o-katana dissipate as I lower my guard. I check the inner side of the shifting sigils looking out for anything irregular, everything seems okay let me get to work.

Shaping a sharp tool from the spirit weapons within me I start curving out a circle around myself testing a theory and lore and behold it works. I can draw sigils whilst in the spirit realm without needing to power them myself.

Quickly I do a simple protective sigil in which I sit with my spiritual body protected with privacy wards established. The ambient spirit which is in everything here or is everything here fills the sigils as it fills everything else keeping them active. I then draw another summing sigil within the protective sigil, a smaller one. One directed to a copy of itself anywhere that’s open.

[SHGUUUP], in a blink of space influxing air the peep-hole through which I am viewing my body is open within the smaller sigil. The new sigil having created a copy of the first one but this one is self-maintaining. I close the first circle completely shutting my connection to watching the door dissipate from this side like windblown sand.

The copy circle is still here looking at my body through the peep-hole I created from within the spirit realm. If I closed this would I be stranding myself here or could I open a portal to anywhere else through the spiritual realm? I already know I can pass through here with my physical body but how do I do so safely? How do I direct my jump from this place to exactly the other place I want to be at?

I open the peep-hole waking in my body as the new sigil blazes in the air before my physical self. A miniture summoning sigil immaculately done as tinny as a peeking hole shines golden before my eyes giving me a glimpse into a world beyond this one. Am I really seeing what I’m seeing? Did I just create a portal to the spiritual realm under my control that costs me nothing to maintain? Can I close it from here?

I close it as easily as I’ve closed any door. Okay, that’s confirmed I can close it.

###

With eager excitement I again activate the summoning circle before me, transferring my consciousness into my spirit-body. Changing the perception of the spirit portal into a peep-hole with a mental command. I check for threats then weaknesses or irregularities in the peep-hole to my body.

Finding none I create a tool using my molten spirit weapons, curving a circle with a circumference of 31.42m exactly following the edges of my awareness from the centre. I make that into a protective circle keyed to me, it blazes satisfyingly self-maintaining itself from the ambient spiritual energy around.

I sit and sift the threads connected to me that are my children, the spiritual thread connecting father with child.

.. this has to be Iki’s without a doubt. This has to be Disha, this is my bond to Aurora, these are the twins Orochi and Serenity almost connected together. This is little Anya’ thread, Little Kira’s is very distinctly her in a way that brings the scent of her sunbaked hair to mind. I catalogue all the threads connected to me realising I can distinguish between them easily, then I do the maths.

It’s Morpheus. It’s my firstborn son Morpheus whose thread I can longer account for.

I let that sink in.

Ingwe will be devastated.

My boy.

I feel the loss to my spirit, suddenly realising I’m lessened in a way for having lost the connection. Yet, yet I am strengthened in another way from the scare of the ripped thread on my spirit-body.

The protective circle breaks open pulling my attention to it as my privacy vanishes. The spirit-ground I had drawn the sigil on having eroded breaking the effect, I fix it but there are weaknesses primed to break all along its dimensions. The same with the peep-hole, I re-enforce everything again to keep them working.

The longer I stay in this place the more I discover about it and how best to use it. Secrets are hinted at me by everything I perceive or experience, there is a lot going on here I could take advantage of in the physical world.

Having ensured the sigils aren’t degrading too quickly I project myself along a thread, consciousness immediately arriving at a beautiful ball of light at its end. Vigdis Saya van Damage. This is the spirit connecting me to Saya, this is the golden pot at the end of my spirit thread. I send love and affection into that light, I send reinforcement, I send strength and everything I am, comfort.

Through the threads connecting us, I send love to all my children, I send love with every ounce of spiritual energy I have to discover that I’m not running out of energy. I’m being refilled as I give out, I send all my love and still have love in abundance. How? ...arg why not?

I send love to everyone spiritually connected to me endlessly. Along all the threads without even sifting then apart I send love.

*

A winged beastman detaches from a flock in the sky shooting towards me fast to land almost gently with clawed digits digging into the rockface looking down at me. It looks at me askew but doesn’t say anything, instead settling in to watch.

I continue moving about fighting Honour’s shadow with everything I’ve got in sweat and speed; moving about hitting blocking dodging as we get at each other aggressively hand to hand. I know her every move and she knows mine; smoothly we flow back and forth attacking each other and defending almost simultaneously in a deadly dance of back and forth aggressive combat.

She shifts forward with a sharp decisive combination of punches and kicks that push me back with her momentum. Her flurry claps the air about us as I deflect every single one, moving with her current to keep myself from being overwhelmed. I back-flip kicking an afterimage amplified cartwheel disrupting her flow as she avoids the impact. She doesn’t let me get away with it, charging fast as I land landing a blow.

We keep at each other moving back and forth always pressing trying to get the upper hand delivering deadly amplified chops unleashing every deadly trick we can think of to get at each other. I get a beating as I give a beating as we continuously achieve a deadly stalemate with every bout against each other.

I fight Shi no Meiyo, I fight myself in a form of jinzen that has her out of my inner world without really leaving it. We are separate yet the same as we unleash on each other moves that have me all about the flat rock field I chose for this meditation session. Fighting my shadow in jinzen I hone myself to be as deadly as is physically possible in zanjutsu.

###

The sigils drawn from the spiritual realm don’t cost me to maintain but they always wear away no matter how deeply I carve them so I’m trying something different. Immense concentration goes into the shaping of the spiritual material of Kata and Razor into the shape of the summoning sigil. I have to make it small because of the scarcity of the material and the details have to be exact but it’s working, the sigil is coming together as I manipulate the spiritual shape of the bound weapons.

Of course, the metal molten into my physical body takes on the same shape; as I create the miniature sigil in exact detail on the palm of my spiritual body so too is it drawn on my physical palm. Distantly I feel the discomfort felt in my physical body as the bound metal moves in my left hand.

[Click]!

The beautiful sound of things falling into alignment across the universe fills my life with power, awareness, freedom. I am in my spirit-body yet also in my physical body at the same time, dizzy but fully aware and cognizant in both as the sigil in my palm connects me together.

I stand in awe as spiritual energy fills my body from the spiritual realm directly filtered through my spirit-body into my physical through the palm circle. My spirit-body is more distinct as it gets solidity from being connected to my physical body. The material world seems t-is ablaze with colour as I look around, both the physical and spiritual realms layered on each other.

I am here and there, a person simultaneously existing in both realms of reality at the same time.

Spirit-aura blazes about me at full must layering my aura in a blanket of spirit that takes my aura’s shape. A spiritual aura that passively protects me from outside influence, cleansing me, bringing everything within my awareness under that blanket of influence, strengthening my body while shielding me from casual examination by other people’s abilities. The sigil blazes a red-tinged golden on my palm to my spiritually aware eyes, it stings but it's bearable.

I feel amazing.

The sigil is stable, anchored on me in both the physical and spiritual realms to continuously feed me spiritual energy whilst giving an always ready portal to the spiritual realm. I calm down my excited heart before getting too far ahead of myself without more testing.

I close the portal watching it dim but the melted fragments of my spirit weapons remain drawn in rusted grey under my skin like a tattoo. My supply of spirit energy stops replenishing as it’s used, I lose connection to my spirit-body blinking as the room becomes the boring empty space it was before I could simultaneously see into both realms.

With a thought, I activate the sigil in my palm re-connecting with my spirit body as it activates again. Let’s see what happens.

I fully open the door in my palm sending a physical ripple through the spiritual realm and a spiritual ripple in the physical that I physically/spiritually perceive as it crosses into the vastness of space. My palm blazes with red-golden light as empty shapeless spiritual energy drift from the portal in my palm, dissipating.

At the same time it feels like hot molten metal has just been deposited into my hand scorching flesh.

I grab a rune-chalk which disintegrates as it crosses the portal in my palm. My canteen filled with water disintegrates, a grade-A rare rated armour gauntlet disintegrates as it passes the threshold. Each object causing a flaring cost in spiritual energy and pain as it crosses, each doing something I can’t interpret in the spiritual even as they are destroyed.

I grab a clump of spirit-dirt, it dissipating into a haze of spiritual energy as it crosses through the palm opening to the physical world. I close it but keep the connection active, cooling my paralysed hand.

I think I could solve all my problems with this, get myself where I need to be amongst many other things that come to mind. I open the circle without much hesitation sticking my finger inside, I hurt but I don’t disintegrate like other objects did.

I stick my whole arm through my palm, feeling the blistering heat/cold of the spiritual realm scotching barely bearable on my desiccating skin. But bearable it is so I bear it.

After a minute I exhale as I pull my dry arm out trembling and crusted over like salt on the shores of the Bluewater, the pain taws away as I immediately start to adjust drinking spirit energy like a dry sponge in water. I flex my fingers as healthy circulation again replaces the dry flecking skin until I am again pink with healthy flesh, all within a few minutes.

I can make it, I can physically survive in the spiritual realm while anchored in this way by the sigil drawn in my palm. Wasting no time I get to work drawing a fresh sigil on the stone floor using my last stylus.

Finishing it quickly I get naked, stuffing all my stuff in the storage bag which I then stuff into my bound storage ring. I take a last breath, ensuring the sigil on my palm is active before activating the sigil on the floor and passing through as the passage opens and closes behind me.

I look around the burning world quickly trying to get my bearings. I’m okay, my spirit-body having merged with my physical body sheathing it in a protective film anchored on my palm. I’m okay, I get to work.

Closing the circle I used to get here I put all my hope in the one in my hand. Quickly identifying my daughter’s thread I pull my perceptions along it until I’m there looking at a beautiful light of spiritual presence.

Wasting no time I start drawing a new sigil with the unused remnants of my spirit tools trying with intent to get it connected to Saya’s presence.

It activates a moment later, I open the portal passing through to the other side without delay.