“Do you know how to improve it after listening to it once?” Nalrond was flabbergasted.
“No sh- shop, genius.” Elysia’s presence triggered the auto-correct for family-friendly language. “As your friend said, I’ve studied the Rezars for a long time and my expertise in light magic made Manohar look like a child in comparison.”
“I’m/He’s not his/my friend.” Lith and Nalrond said in unison.
“Really?” Dawn furrowed her brows. “Going through so much trouble to help you heal in the body and the mind sounds like something a friend would do.”
“He did?” Nalrond was flabbergasted.
“Lith informed us of your arrival and asked us to go easy on you in case things got out of hand.” Dawn nodded. “Anyway, off the top of my head, there are two points that you have to reconsider.
“First, you can’t just let your life forces meet and hope for the best. That’s something that regular hybrids are forced to do because they have no idea when the barrier between their life forces is going to fall apart and make them clash.
“In your case, you can make it happen any time you want. You might as well be prepared. Weakening your life forces by wounding your bodies will weaken their clashes and make them more receptive to your will, but that’s it.
“If your goal is to merge your life forces, you should use Body Sculpting to create an artificial link between them. This way, their energies are going to flow into each other and reduce the friction between them.
“It’s the same thing a Forgemaster does when applying runes during the preparatory phase.” Dawn said and Lith nodded for her to continue. “Second, cracking both your cores is unnecessarily dangerous.
“You’d better try and see if they merge along with your life forces. Then, if that fails, consider cracking solely the mana core of the life force you are more willing to discard.
“Even if you can’t make the mana cores merge, as long as you have a perfect life force and one healthy core you should survive.”
“This is very interesting.” Kalla said while taking notes with water magic and adapting the process for Lichhood. “According to my previous and almost lethal failures, however, it’s better to collect data before attempting the actual procedure.
“Even with the Eyes, it might take a few tries. We have no idea how long Nalrond’s life forces are going to remain stable enough to study them and he needs time to recover before performing a new attempt.”
“Right. The Eyes.” Dawn said, looking at the Wight in envy. “Well, if you don’t need us anymore, we’d go back to our experiments.”
Solus looked at Nalrond who replied: “Yes, we are done here.”
“In case anything else comes to your mind, please ask Vladion to contact us. He has Lith’s rune.” Solus didn’t trust the Horseman enough to give Dawn her contact rune.
Also, she wanted to avoid further upsetting Nalrond.
“Where is Malyshka? I was hoping to meet her.”
“Mother is busy. As more and more members of the Undead Corts are leaving the surface, the Eclipsed Lands are running out of space.” Dawn replied. “Before helping them to build a new city, however, she wants to make sure her children from the surface have truly turned a new leaf.
“I’ll let her know you’ve been looking for her.”
Friya and Quylla had never been in the Eclipsed Lands and were curious to see the rest of Lightkeep. Yet Nalrond was in dire need of rest. His physical wounds had already disappeared whereas his mental scars had been torn open again.
Everyone returned to the tower and a quick Warp brought them back to the Verhen Mansion. Thanks to Scarlett’s Sunshade array that absorbed the excess light element of the day, Nyka wasn’t hindered by the sun as long as she remained away from the windows.
“Take all the time you need.” Lith brought Nalrond to the Rezar’s private quarters on the first floor of the tower. “We need you at the top of your game before you give us a practical demonstration of the procedure.”
He left a tray of steaming food on the table and was about to leave the room when Nalrond stopped him.
“Why did you do that?”
“You need to be more specific.”
“Why did you force me to meet Dawn and Acala? You know what they did to me. If you thought we needed a second opinion so badly, we could have had that conversation through a communication amulet.” Nalrond asked.
“Because you remind me a lot of how I was until a while ago.” Lith replied. “So focused on what I’ve lost that I disregarded what I had and, more importantly, what I could have if I just pulled my head out of my ass.”
He shapeshifted into his Tiamat form while holding Elysia’s little hands. The baby girl shapeshifted as well, smiling from ear to ear as the Dragon scales transmitted the love that her father was unable to express with words.
“Let me guess.” Nalrond sighed. “In my shoes, you wouldn’t put at stake what I have with Friya nor go on with the procedure.”
“No. That’s why I say we are not friends. You don’t know the first thing about me.” The Tiamat snarled. “In your shoes, I would absolutely try the procedure. The idea of not being able to protect Kami and Solus is unbearable to me.
“And don’t get me started about dragging Elysia in my sh-op. What I wouldn’t do is let my pride get in the way of my survival. I don’t care who or what I have to ask for help. As long as I ca come back to my family at the end of every day, the rest doesn’t matter.”
***
While Nalrond sorted out the mess that his mind was, Lith and the others worked to synch the various pieces of the Set of Menadion. Luckily, they already knew how to connect the two Eyes and with the help of the artifacts, synching the Mouths and the Hands was just a matter of time.
“If my hypothesis is correct, this is going to more than double our magical prowess.” Solus explained. “You see, after the last upgrade, the tower has recovered a few floors that need the pieces of the Set of Menadion to work.
“Even though the single external pieces can’t connect with the tower by themselves, the problem should be solved by synching them with their respective tower twin.”
Since Lith and Solus had nothing noteworthy for the Grimoire and the Thievery to study, Solus activated the Spark. It allowed them to further refine the pieces they had already Forgemastered without the need to break them down with Creation Magic and then enchant them again.
Solus put the tower’s Hands on the stone pedestal, channelling the vigorous flow of world energy necessary to activate the full power of the artifact and start the refining process.
Ragnarök was already comprised of Davross and elemental crystals so it had no need for the Spark. The Voidwalker armors, the Sage Staff, and Double Edge, instead still had a long way to go.
