(21) Welcome To The Core

“Hoo,” Tara exhaled, forcing her breath to exit in a steady stream.

She sat cross-legged on her bed within the former slaves’ temporary encampment. Tara had initially suspected that Nemesis was throwing them all together in a room due to some snobbish disrespect—not that it mattered. Her compatriots lived essentially in a cage, so even sharing a single room was a massive improvement.

However, Nemesis had showered them with food, clothing, and—literally—showered them. They had some kind of plumbing that allowed water to fall from the ceiling. Standing under the water, which felt like bathing in the rain, was an experience Tara would never forget.

The kindness they had been shown by the scant few members of the guild they had met, coupled with the fabulous meals and living conditions, had Tara beginning to believe Theron when he said there were no guest rooms. How such a titanic structure could be built without expecting to have company was beyond her. Theron’s explanation was straightforward, but also difficult to parse.

“Our lady built the guild exactly to the specs we need. There’s not more than a single bedroom for every member. When you use the bathhouse, you’re using the same facilities we use. When you eat in the dining hall, you’re sitting at the same tables we sit at.

“Might be hard to believe, kid, but there wasn’t any ‘visiting’ back in our day. If you were showing up at our door and not a member of the guild, well…I’d hate to be in your shoes. It was real dog-eat-dog, though I hear that’s not changed much after two hundred years.”

That was certainly true—the Crater, the Peaks, it was all kill or be killed—but even the clans had holdings for various visitors, and they were just as brutal as what Theron described.

Tara inhaled steadily, forcing her body to remain calm, despite what felt like fire running through her veins. Her idle musing was helping to distract her from the pain, but she could not afford to be too loose with her thoughts. The mana exercises Nephthys had described were brutal, and even worse, they required her to actively think.

She almost wished she could do something physically taxing, like digging holes. At least that way, she could zone out and forget about how her body screamed. Not so with mana circulation, though, and it took all her concentration to make sure she did not scream to match the cries from her muscles and bones.

She pushed her mana through her body, circulating it throughout her frame in a pattern that matched her Light spell, or an approximation of it, at least. This was what Nephthys suggested: manually circulating her mana—a nearly insane notion to Tara, as the Words handled mana circulation during a spell’s cast.

How could she ever circulate her own mana better than the force that controlled the world? Yet Nephthys had clearly demonstrated that such a thing was possible. Or if Tara took Nephthys at her word, she had. The Bolide demonstration was obvious even to the untrained.

Nephthys’s self-cast spell had been significantly stronger and faster. It was possible that she had simply specified a lower power output when using the Words to cast as a feint, but not only would Nephthys have no reason to do that, it would not explain why her self-cast was faster than the Words’.

No, Tara suspected that Nephthys was being straight with her, so straight that it was uncomfortable. The woman acted as if she had never cast with the Words at all. How was that possible? How would one even learn to cast on their own, never interacting with the Words? Had Nephthys simply found Praxic spells and studied the diagrams long enough to cast them herself?

Impossible.

“Haa—hoo,” Tara breathed, steadying herself once again.

Losing herself in thought eased the pain slightly, but she also lost her calm; her breathing became erratic. One thing she knew for sure was that the body would follow the mind, but if she let her body lead, her mind would follow. A chaotic body would lead to a chaotic mind, and she did not want to know what would happen if she failed to circulate her mana, leaving it to run rampant and uncontrolled through her body.

It already felt like she had molten lava moving within her, and this was the controlled version. It felt as if the mana were scouring her out from the inside, obliterating anything in its path, be it flesh, blood, or organs.

With a long exhale, she streamed the mana back into her core, deciding her practice would have to end for the time being as her gut rumbled. When the last trickle of mana faded from her body, she bolted upright. She cleared the distance between her bed, positioned near the back of what was obviously meant to be some kind of storage hall, and the door in a matter of seconds.

She covered her mouth as she sprinted down the large corridor, grateful there was no one around either to get in her way or see her like this. She flung the door open to the nearest toilet—blessedly unoccupied—and bent over the strange water-retaining bowl on the ground.

What she heaved was repulsive beyond imagining. She had thrown up plenty, just like anyone else, yet it had never been this…dark or odorous. The black sludge exited her mouth far too slowly for her liking, and she followed her retches with a good deal of gagging and spitting, desperate to get whatever horrendous infection possessed her out.

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Huffing and puffing, she flipped the lever to send her shame away. Leaning back against the wall, she stared at the ceiling, contemplating.

What was that?!

Tara felt as if she had excised a demon. Strangely, she felt good now that it was out. Her mind was focused, sharp. She felt no pain, her body not even sore. She had thought for sure that the mana scouring would leave a mark at least as bad as exercising, yet she felt as if she could run the perimeter of the Crater without stopping to catch her breath.

She sat there, slumped against the bathroom wall, for a few minutes as her sweat dried up, gathering herself. Eventually, footsteps hurrying past the door, accompanied by eager voices, drew her out of her reverie. She recognized Numa’s voice among them and opened the door, just as they passed.

“Oh, Tara! You’re just in time! Come on!” Numa squeaked, surprised by Tara’s sudden emergence.