190, 1/2

Erick flicked his mana through the machine again, and over the course of ten seconds, the sleepy grey rat transformed into a sleepy goldfish. He cut the magic. The lustrous waters around the fish turned from bright white, to something lesser, and then they lost their light altogether. The fish remained sleepy.

There were many parts of Redflame’s Renewal Tank system that Erick did not fully understand. [Baleful Polymorph] was one of those spells, but Erick was pretty sure that he was getting the hang of that magic. Once he got out of here, he could probably make that spell easy enough.

That spell was basically [Polymorph] but twisted into an attack, which made a great deal of difference. Primarily, the person casting the spell was choosing to mutate a person’s existence into something else, but since that was such a broad category of event, there were a lot of small, unsaid rules. Size played a big deal in such a transformation, as well as what the target’s current categorization in the Script. A human-sized target was generally transformed into another human-sized person, with orcol being a very, very rare option. If the target was an orcol, they were usually transformed into a different orcol, and usually one of the opposite sex, with all options usually being a smaller form than the target’s original form. With enough casts, an undirected [Baleful Polymorph] might transform an orcol all the way into a human, or an incani, or a harpy, or whatever. This sort of cast almost always gave the target a physically weaker form, for that was the basic, cheap, undirected version of that spell.

Directed [Baleful Polymorph] was what everyone usually thought of when they heard ‘[Baleful Polymorph]. This then was the full version of the spell, which transformed a target into another form specifically chosen by the caster. An orcol could become a frog. A frog could become an orcol. [Baleful Polymorph] did not change the soul or the mind, though.

[Baleful Polymorph] did not actually give the afflicted person the Familiar Form chosen by the caster, nor did it remove the original Familiar Form of the afflicted. If one were [Baleful Polymorph]ed, all one needed to do was to get [Polymorph] and then use that to transform back to their original Form.

[Baleful Polymorph] could not be [Dispel]ed, though. It was an instant effect; there was nothing to dispel once the magic was done.

If the afflicted wished to actually gain the Familiar Form that they were [Baleful Polymorph]ed into, then that was a whole lot more difficult. There was the slow process of a person just living out their new life and gradually defining their new form as a Familiar Form. Or, there was a quicker way. This quicker way was through Soul Magic. Horribly difficult Soul Magic, too, which usually mangled a person into a monster along the way.

Or rather…

That’s how it had been for a long time.

Until today.

Inferno Maw blinked and huffed for the fifth time since arriving in the enchanting hangar of Redflame’s castle. He gestured forward as he stared at the small Renewal Tank sitting on the sturdy wooden table. “Flip the switch and do it again, if you please.”

Erick complied, flipping a little switch on the side of the fish/rat tank to select for rat. And then he started channeling [Renew].

Ten seconds later, the sleepy gold fish was now a sleepy wet rat. Tiny bubbles of air escaped from his slack mouth, burbling upward to break on the surface of the water.

Erick waited. Redflame waited, too, standing to the side and barely able to contain his own small joy. With Inferno Maw’s increasingly incredulous and disbelieving attitude, it was easy for Erick to feel good about the outcome of this new form of soul surgery and Familiar Form granting.

Inferno Maw straightened up. The dour, tall man was rather skinny-seeming in his long grey and black robes; especially with his large grey horns which arced straight up and a little bit backward. He paused in thought, then turned to his own grey-robed subordinate, saying, “I need an assortment of monsters. Select the meanest, smaller subjects and bring them here.”

The subordinate bowed then turned his head and started a telepathic conversation with someone far away.

Erick frowned, though. Monsters? What was Inferno Maw trying to do? Heal monsters of some sort of essence problem? Monsters didn’t have essence problems. Redflame also gave Inferno Maw a critical eye, unsure of what was going on.

Inferno Maw looked down at Erick, for no other reason than he was rather tall. He turned slightly to take in Redflame, too, and then he spoke to both of them, “Your machine is a miracle. I urge you to create one large enough to take in a person and we start healing our people held in [Stasis], and soon. It is time to increase the rate of production. But more than that!” Inferno Maw’s countenance took on a smooth sort of joy, as though he was on the cusp of solving some of his own problems. “I wish to use this machine to try and clear out the ambient, uncontrolled mana that accumulates in the core of monsters, driving them to madness. I wish to attempt the creation of a true spirit beast; an enlightened animal. Moreover, this will prove whether or not it is possible to turn a wyrm back into a person. To bring back the voice of the voiceless, to restore sound to the silent!”

… Oh. That’s what he was trying to do.

Redflame balked. “Restore a wyrm to sapience? Impossible.”

Inferno Maw digressed, “We might not be able to restore a wyrm to their draconic self, since I think that the Null Ring might be the only true way for this magic to work, but we most certainly can try to bring back a wyrm from such an ignoble death. Or at least we can clear out their soul and allow them to pass on to whatever afterlife they desire. At the very least, and based on what I am seeing, I expect to be able to transform a wyrm into a human, or something along those lines.”

Erick had a few concerns, though.

“Aren’t wyrms dead?” Erick added, “Undead? You can’t [Baleful Polymorph] an object, can you? The spell does target the body, after all, and not the soul. And wyrms don’t have any Dragon Essence anyway?”

Inferno Maw smiled brightly, saying, “You are correct about the limitations of [Baleful Polymorph], but while [Baleful Polymorph] does not appear to work on undead, it still does. It works on anything with a soul. I may be wrong, but I suspect that if you were to put an undead rat with a rad into that tank there, you would be able to create a living fish, simultaneously disintegrating and creating a new fishy-body for the little no-longer-a-rat. I have no idea how the rad would fare through the transition, but I have certain hopes that I must see if they can be fulfilled.

“Wyrms are very complicated undead; completely unlike all other undead, and primarily because they take in and utilize ambient mana at an astonishing rate. They are still monsters, after all, which makes them fit into a category of ‘ambient mana collectors’, and I believe your machine can clear out the ambient mana in a core, replacing what was lost with properly accreted mana.

“I have no idea if such a thing will actually produce a spirit beast, or bring back the voice of a wyrm, but it’s an intriguing proposition and I must discover if it works, or not. What I suspect will happen is that the test subject regains life, but they are no longer who they were when they went into the process. This would be a problem— Eh! Something to figure out later.” He turned and waved a hand at the larger Renewal Tank, and all the scattered enchanting parts, saying, “But what’s more than that! This magic might allow us to accelerate the accretion-time of anyone, allowing the user to use ‘ambient mana’ in the form of Script-granted mana to turn [Renew] upon themselves, allowing one to reach Second and Third and higher Foundations in a matter of days instead of centuries!” Inferno Maw exclaimed, “Monsters rendered reasonable! Accretion accelerated ahead! Every student a genius, gaining—” He paused, frowned, and called out, “Where are you, Fairy Moon? I hear your presence.”

Huh.

Well. The Fairy Moon part aside, accelerated accretion was a great big thing, wasn’t it?

Could a dragon benefit from this, though? No.

Or at least… Not right now?

It was a question. Erick was not sure. The Null Ring stripped all essence from a person, and this very much included Dragon Essence, mutated or not. And there was another problem he needed to consider; the problem of the person-with-a-core versus the person-without-a-core.

While Erick was considering all that, Fairy Moon stepped out of the air.

“My influence inundates this tired, long lived land, Inferno Maw, so it is no wonder you witness my mien all over the everywhere.” Fairy Moon asked, “What do you want?”

“Just to know where you were,” Inferno Maw said, nodding. He turned back to Erick. “You seem concerned over what I just said. Elaborate?”

Redflame had been concerned, too, but his expression was rather inscrutable. He was somewhere between thrilled and concerned.

Erick was firmly concerned. “My problem is that I thought most mortal races could not handle having a core. The people and rats we’ve worked this magic on before did not have cores, but my original design was to include the possibility of a core in a person, and yet Redflame skipped around that possibility because none of the subjects had cores. I only realized then, that cores inside of a person could be bad.

“Most people with cores turn into cannibals. Dragons and half-dragons do not, apparently.

“But Redflame removed the core capability that I had put into my original ring so that this magic could be used on everyone.

“So, my question is this: can mortal races handle having cores? A half-dragon needs mutated Dragon Essence to allow them to hold a core and not go insane, right? This machine erases all Dragon Essence in a person, after all, and it does not work with a person with a core… Though it would be easy enough to go back to my original design if we’re going to be working with cores.”

Redflame inclined his head. Erick had laid out all of his concerns, too. Inferno Maw smiled a little bit, as though Erick had asked an interesting question, but he already knew the answer.

“Ah! Cannibals.” Inferno Maw nodded. “Not a problem.” Erick was not convinced, though, and Inferno Maw saw this, so he continued, “People turning cannibal because of a core is a widespread misconception. While Dragon Essence does have a centering effect, and it does increase the mana one naturally produces, Dragon Essence on its own does not actually enable a person to accrete without turning monster. In order to accrete without turning monster one must know what they are doing, and they must start from a place of one’s own power.

“Most people, be they human or incani or otherwise, when they allow a rad to coalesce inside themselves, they are allowing ambient mana to form the seed of their core. Such a person has automatically started off on the wrong path, and will inevitably become a monster. But! If they had started with a seed of their own creation, then they would have been fine. They likely wouldn’t have gotten anywhere and they would have rapidly devolved into a monster, because people, on their own, do not produce much mana. Dragon Essence increases the mana one self-produces from around 10 mana per day to anywhere between 500 and 5000, and it is at this breakpoint that one actually gains the ability to properly accrete. But theoretically a human with a core of their own make could remain themselves.” With a playful smirk, Inferno Maw said, “Those are just nuances to know for the future, though, because, if I am right, then this thing can even save cannibals, and all other monsters, pulling them out of their polluted-mana fugues. It might be able to reestablish the seed of a core!

“I have no idea what such a cannibal-turned-person would even look like! Most ‘cannibals’ are variant-races, with odd abilities based on what they do while they are monsters. Would they retain those odd abilities? Or would this [Renew Soul] you have carved into this machine actually [Renew] them back down to base person, but with a Second Foundation core, and all the added power thereof?

“But yes; a normal person with a core is a problem because they don’t have the natural mana production to keep their core stable. Such a person would need to use a tank like this every week, or so, I would assume.” Inferno Maw said, “So it is quite possible that we will need to make this thing dissolve the core of whoever is placed inside, too. That will be rather difficult. We might need to do that working in a separate way.”

Ah.

Well then.

… Shit?

Erick had a distressing series of thoughts that boiled down rather fast to a distressing conclusion, and question. Had he accidentally created a method to easily gain super soldiers? Super soldiers that needed to come back into base every so often, or else they would turn monster?

That seemed truly rife for abuse.

… But also: Had he created a way to save every cannibal out there from their monstrous nature? Rozeta had even spoken of how [Renew] should be able to turn a monster into a non-monster. Had she foreseen this specific event, right here?

She had.

Was this… Okay?

Redflame, thankfully, brought the concern back to the actual problem. “We might have created a monster ourselves, but the core-problem aside: This will work, won’t it? Erick’s new design? Will it save people from [Stasis], and from the Trial of the Wyrm?”

“Oh yes. I would hesitate to call this [Renew Soul] a true transformation— a [Reincarnation], as you call it— but only because it’s a magic that has not been recognized by the Script. But that problem is easily solved when you get back to Veird, Erick. Just sing a little song to the mana and make a Blessing out of this magic.” Inferno Maw turned to Redflame, saying, “You and I might be able to extrapolate this effect into a Blessing, too. You, Redflame, might be able to create a Blessing of Carnage, and anyone so blessed might be able to accrete for a theoretical [Carnage Body]. It would still take an act of Wizardry to cause a person with both [Carnage Body] and [Dragon Body] to join them together, using Carnage to erase the Curse in the Dragon Essence, but it seems theoretically doable. It would be a lot more difficult than using [Renew] to simply cause Carnage Dragon, or Fae Dragon, or Death Dragon, but it should be doable.” He turned to Erick. “Similarly, you might not be able to create a Benevolence Dragon, but you could likely enable a person —through the use of a specific enough Blessing— to accrete toward a [Benevolence Body]. From there, the blessed person would need to accrete a [Dragon Body] on their own, but they should be able to then gain a Benevolence Dragon existence through the combination of those two abilities— with your assistance, of course.”

Redflame hesitated to be joyful, electing prudence instead, saying, “I desire to first heal our people. Anything else that comes about will have to happen on its own time.”

Erick stepped in, saying, “I want to heal people, too. Not make soldiers for war.”

Redflame flinched, and then nodded.

“… Ah.” Inferno Maw paused. “Hmm. I am not one for war, either, but I could see how most people would assume this would be for war… I was considering how much power it would take to tame the Crystal Forest. But this would be used for war, first and foremost, wouldn’t it.” He paused. He said, “Okay. New plan. All of what I just said about cores and accretion will remain theoretical, since Erick is the only one who can actually do this right now, since he has [Renew]. So we simply won’t experiment in that direction. Let us stick to healing the malformed.”

Erick felt a great relief. He also felt a lot better about who Inferno Maw was, as a person, too. The Death Dragon hadn’t said a single thing about Erick being a Wizard, or that all of Erick’s accomplishments were based on Wizardry. Erick had been worried about that, but that was probably just his self consciousness talking.

By Redflame’s expression he felt a great sort of relief at not making soldiers for war, too.

And then Inferno Maw brought back Erick’s anxiety, saying, “But I do want to test a properly made machine on a monster. I need to see if it can turn a monster into a spirit beast. I need to see if it can heal a wyrm.”

“… Okay.” Erick said, “I guess I need to know if it actually works that way, too.”

In the future, Erick expected this Renewal Tank system to be well studied. Many people would find out that the only real difference between the core-version of the Renewal Tank and the non-core version was a sub-runic-web which used [Identify] to check for a core, or for the absence of a core, and then adjust accordingly between a focused [Renew] or a larger scale [Renew]. The core-system was a lot simpler than a non-core system, too.

Ahh.

Super soldiers which required those soldiers to come in for weekly treatments.

Maybe that wouldn’t happen, though?

Erick could only think back to Rats, who left over a year ago, and his weekly healing treatments to deal with his lingering Necromancer-caused soul and body wounds. Had Rats been an attempt at a super soldier program?

Redflame breathed deep, worried, and yet resigned.

Fairy Moon nodded, also satisfied, then she said, “It’s past the dinner hour, anyway, so let’s pause this pursuit of knowledge and do more soul surgery when we have satiated stomachs.” She gestured toward the door. “Maid Maria and Redflame’s Chefs have manufactured a magnificent meal which awaits our presence in the small-persons solarium.”

Another realization struck Erick, and this time directly in his stomach. He hadn’t eaten in at least 18 hours. “I could eat.”

For a brief moment Inferno Maw looked like he was going to object to Fairy Moon’s proclamation, but he resigned himself to dinner.

Because Redflame was happy to hear the news of food. He grinned. “Yes! It is time for a break. We will speak more of specifics over a nice meal.” He began walking to the door, saying, “I know that some of our designs are less than perfect, Inferno Maw, so if you have any ideas there they would be most welcome.”

As a group, Erick, Inferno Maw, and Fairy Moon began walking alongside Redflame.

Inferno Maw began, “Well. There are some oddities I see in the design, but I would speak of larger philosophy-level design issues. For one, the [Sleep] magic included in the working could be better, or not included at all, and anesthetic magical herbs should be used instead. Sleepweed for orcol bodies. Drowsydip for human bodies. Rednumb weed as a general numbing agent would be good. Also, [Sleep] is not a good spell for this since it doesn’t actually numb the body.”

Erick offered, “What about a Particle Magic sleeping-like overlapping spell, that includes [Cleanse] to both keep the person under, while also numbing their body? That spell is highly flammable, though; just to caution you.”

Inferno Maw began, “Ah. A specific Particle Magic sleeping spell would be useful, though you would need to strip out the [Cleanse] effect and make multiple Particle-based spells; one for each race. This would highly complicate the whole structure. Possibly too much. My suggestion was made in order to simplify the whole thing.”

“Oh. Well. I can see how the [Cleanse] would be dangerous outside of Script-assistance on Veird, since the [Cleanse] effect in the Renewal Tank needs to be targeted—” Erick said, “But my Particle spell is just one spell. Works on everyone. It’s not a [Sleep], for too much will kill a person, but it works on everyone.”

Redflame and Inferno Maw both stared at Erick.

“You have a Particle Magic sleeping spell?” Inferno Maw asked. “That works on everyone?”

“Everyone tested so far. Monsters and animals and otherwise.” Erick said, “Normally, it should not work like that, but I think that many of the underlying aspects of life on Veird are rather uniform, and likely due to the Grand Translation.”

Redflame’s eyes were wide.

Inferno Maw stared for a single moment, then he threw his head back and laughed once. “I look forward to this alliance, Erick, for you are so much more than a Wizard.”

Flattery was nice, Erick supposed. He smiled a little.

Redflame asked, “It’s not a simple numbness particulate, is it? Because that would lead to soul trauma from a ‘locked-in’ person suffering through everything.”

Erick nodded, understanding the question, and then he started talking about the history of anesthesia back on Earth. It wasn’t long till Inferno Maw spoke of the various methods for [Sleep]-adjacent magics that could be used on the people of Veird, and how the Mind Mages had a lockdown on the actual [Sleep] spell. Erick smiled and talked of how his own [Sleep]-adjacent Particle Magic had already been vetted as ‘okay’.

From there, the conversation moved onto [Renew] as they entered the dining room.

Over a wonderful meal, Redflame began speaking of various different ailments that could be fixed with this new methodology. Anyone with withered-soul syndrome to parasite syndrome, to maybe even Curses, both large and small, could be healed by a reset-to-Null. Inferno Maw was a bit more reserved in his hopes than that, stating what Erick was already thinking.

“This new magic is both a blessing and a curse.” Inferno Maw rhetorically asked, “Does everyone want to be reset to Null? Absolutely not. I don’t want that, and neither do you, or Erick here, either. We all have our own powers inside of ourselves that would spell the End for us if we were to erase them. In this way, while you have created a wonder of modern medicine, you have also created a new weapon of unparalleled power. Healing Magic that can turn a person into a weakling.”

Redflame scowled. “You are being too dramatic, Inferno Maw. I admit the rate of change to a rat’s soul and shape was rather worryingly quick, but people are larger, and such a rate of change would naturally take longer, because the rate of change is based upon the size of the targeted soul. Such a magic is not instant, and that type of magic would be truly dangerous. Density likely plays a part in transformation times as well, and we don’t even know if this will work on a target that is able to defend itself through Health or other soul-defenses.” He added, “We’re here in Ar’Cosmos, where people don’t have Health, so that normal defense system is simply not present.”

Erick had felt a spike of worry at Inferno Maw’s words, but Redflame’s perspective brought some much needed calm. And besides that, “It’s just the removal of Elemental Essence influences and the healing of a soul to full, anyway. It won’t actually stop someone from still being dangerous. I imagine that outside of specific spellwork or hospital settings that this type of thing might not ever see a battlefield.”

Except in the case of super soldiers, but Erick didn’t voice that concern.

Inferno Maw shrugged, adding, “Capturing and containing a person is not difficult for one such as you or I, and once a target is captured, this magic would certainly make it easier to contain those particular malcontents. With enough research into this phenomenon one might even be able to make spellwork that can erase Script-implanted spells, taking for yourself the ability that only gods and House Fae possess.”

Fairy Moon spoke up, “I caution against claiming that particular power, or any other Wizardly ways that Ar’Cosmos already knows are not allowed in the wider world.”

Inferno Maw shrugged. “Rozeta doesn’t like unsanctioned Wizards; this is true. She’ll likely send paladins after you if you mucked around with those sorts of powers, or even for possessing such knowledge and theoretical capability.” He looked around the table, at Redflame, and at Fairy Moon, saying, “On another note: I’m not too sure how we’re going to settle a few particular long-term grievances, for I am loathe to have my mind stripped by inquisitors or anyone else.”

This tale has been unlawfully obtained from Royal Road. If you discover it on Amazon, kindly report it.

Erick frowned a little, asking, “Is that going to be an actual problem? Are they going to ask to mind wipe— Ah. They… They already did ask to mind wipe me when I left the Core.”

Redflame and Inferno Maw both nodded, knowingly.

Fairy Moon, however, just said, “Tell them to go wallow in deep water, for every Forgotten Campaign they ever enacted has been fulfilled first by Rozeta’s removal of Reality from the mana. We might know of some magics out there, but we cannot cast them, or touch them, or make the mana manifest as it could, or should, be able to act.”

Erick had no idea what to say to that, but he found some words anyway. “You mean… the Forgotten Campaigns were successful? Even here?”

Fairy Moon said, “Ar’Cosmos has been breached before. Never fully, but full death has come, and come again for this fae land.”

Redflame frowned a little, as he stared down at his half-eaten dinner. Inferno Maw took a bit too long to cut another bite off of his steak.

And then Inferno Maw sped back up, shrugging off his concerns, and saying, “The Mind Mages have taken much from us, but they have left us with our lives, which is more than what I can say for what the wrought would do to us, if they could. Tiny tyrants in the making, each and every one of them. At least the alliance of the Mind Mages and the wrought is not sheathed-sword perfect. We might have some leeway to avoid some of the Mind Mage problems… Not all of it, though.”

Redflame put on a falsely bright facade, moving along the discussion as he said to Erick, “If everything goes well with keeping you safe and ensuring this alliance of ours survives past stepping out our front door, I would like to see a new city in the Crystal Forest in about five months. I hope to have our people healed by then, and ready to actually take to the desert.”

Inferno Maw said, “I’m surprised that you don’t want to start a new city in the Forest, Redflame. You’ve spoken about that before.”

“I can help a new forest grow anywhere I wish.” Redflame smile a bit more, and this time it was real. “The forests south of the Wyrmridge were smaller than the ones here up north, so that is why I settled up here. But I could move south. Might be nice!”

The conversation moved on to other, nicer topics.

Dinner was rather good.

Eventually, Erick, Inferno Maw, and Redflame got back to the enchanting room. Fairy Moon came along, but she barely said anything, contenting herself to observe while everyone else drew up plans and secured materials. She did tell Erick that he could take Ophiel off of the node, though, when Redflame started talking about the hundreds of people already lined up and waiting for their success.

And so, Erick began resummoning Ophiel, and they began constructing prototype 4.

– – – –

The large tank was made of clear glass, thick as a hand and about four meters across. It was wrapped with a vertical band of platinum just as thick, forming a heavily-carved runic-web [Renew] rune that surrounded the glass enclosure. The only opening was at the top, where the gap in the rune allowed a test subject to be placed into the machine. There was no patient yet, for right now Inferno Maw was telekinetically guiding a small pool’s worth of water from the spigot in the wall, into that tank, like flowing a stream through the air.