Chapter 1195: Book 18-7.1: Magi of Bellemer

Lucian couldn’t help but scowl once the scrying mirror revealed the girl perched on a rooftop. That was supposed to be his baby sister, but nothing about her so much as resembled Amie!“Blood doesn’t lie,” Elaine Nimdahl said softly, glancing pointedly at the focus component that he’d provided, which was, suitably, a vial of extracted blood taken less than an hour ago. 

Lucian squinted at the image, then reluctantly nodded. There were bits and pieces of the girl’s features that matched. The hair was golden, but the eyes were the same shape. They were blue now, instead of brown. His eyes crinkled. Her hair and eyes, as well as her suddenly fairer skin, now matched the Westenland ideals of beauty.

There were other subconscious mannerisms that remained. The way she tilted her head, the way she pouted her lips while she was deep in thought…they were all there. The subconscious tells were there, but the way she moved was different. More confident. More…predatory. 

“She must have awakened…or she could have been replaced.” Elaine mused.

“How? I would have noticed something!” Lucian growled as the woman shot him a reproachful side eye. He had little choice but to duck his head in apology. They were his path to the future now, and there was no reason to antagonise his sponsors in a fit of pique. 

“Changelings would be quite good at mimicking those they replaced. They wouldn’t be able to survive otherwise,” Elaine said dryly. “But I agree.”

“What do you mean?” 

“If she is a changeling inserted into your sister’s life, something would have been noticed,” Elaine said. “But I’ve been looking at the Weissnacht and Rotblume’s tracking of her, and she circles your residence, your workplace, and her old home, though without entering any of them. Clearly, something is holding her there, and just as clearly, something is stopping her from making contact with you.” 

Lucian snorted. “Probably ‘cause she doesn’t remember my pager number.” 

Elaine’s blank look only prompted a chuckle. 

“Yeah. I…left her a message the day you rescued me. She hasn’t made contact, but she had lingered around Diamond Residences, and I haven’t been back there at all.” 

“Well, no need to go through such hoops. We’ll approach her directly.” 

Lucian leaned back, then started when Amie's eyes turned towards the sensor. She frowned for a moment, then glared. Elaine pursed her lips, then shifted the sensor slightly, and nodded when Amie’s eyes tracked the movement. She observed for a few moments, then dismissed the scrying spell. 

“Interesting. She isn’t just a changeling. I think she awakened as a magi as well.” 

“Because she detected you?” 

“Yes. Even Night Kindred who are versed in their Discipline of Awareness have trouble detecting subtle spells.” 

Lucian arched an eyebrow, “I find that an unlikely truth.”

The magi chuckled ruefully. “Aye, you’re right. It depends on a magi’s Arcana Weaving skill on how subtle a spell could be. I am trained in subtle casting; however, the fact that your sister detected my sensor means that she has a way to detect weaving. Hence, she is likely also capable of such.” 

“Then…?”

“Yes, there’s room for more than one Roth magi in Bellemer Academy.” 

“Great!” Lucian jumped to his feet.

“Hold on, we’ll contact her tomorrow. For now, continue with your exercises.” 

“Er, yes.” 

____________

After the scrying sensor disappeared, Yuriko remained on the rooftop with her hands gripping both combat knives firmly. They were still sheathed since she didn’t want to brandish them without an open foe, but she was ready for any kind of trouble. Was this how that woman found her? 

She didn’t remember the sensation of a scrying spell back then, but she hadn’t exactly been in proper shape. 

Yuriko paced around the rooftop while the sun began to set. Those people had a penchant for starting things by twilight, so it was prime time for trouble. But a couple of hours past dusk and nothing happened. Her focus was soon interrupted by her grumbling tummy, so she sighed, relaxed, and headed to a nearby diner to eat. She spent twenty Weyrmarks for a decently sized meal, then hunted for a new empty apartment to squat in. 

This time, she stayed well away from her brother’s or her mum’s place, and she was unbothered for the rest of the night. She spent the time until midnight foraging, then slept until dawn. 

When she woke up, it was to her greater self knocking on the doorway of her mind. She faced the window to meet the dawn. She’d chosen the apartment to face east for that reason, and once the light touched her, the connection between her and her greater self opened completely. 

Oh. 

Only a day had passed since the last synchronisation, and everything she took note of was known to all of her. 

Of greater import was that her Sword Ennoias had already begun to merge.

There was no way to encompass every aspect of swordsmanship in an Ennoia, and Yuriko stopped trying. Instead, she built her Sword Truth upon the idea that it was imperfect, yet sought perfection. Growth. 

The three distinct Ennoias practically jumped together to merge, and the whole was simply called Yuriko's Sword. The Truth of Yuriko’s Sword. 

The Sword Seals her 2nd-incarnation body formed were outdated, but not quite useless. They could still form Adamant Guardian Seals, but the path had changed. She didn’t rebuild the Ennoia cores of each of her incarnations, or really, just her 2nd-incarnation since her Astoria body wasn’t partitioned from herself. 

She also noted the unseemly influences of the 2nd’s former identity, but she felt that she owed the dead girl clemency anyway. After all, she had practically stolen the girl’s body, no matter how likely it was that nothing would have remained after those cretins finished feeding on her. 

For that reason, she added a mission. Revenge? Not quite. Cleansing. She didn’t think that those bloodsuckers worked independently of each other, considering that law enforcement openly hunted her 2nd-incarnation down. Rakkisgrad was in the hands of those people, and her newfound Truth clamoured to be tested. 

Hmmm, perhaps removing every bloodsucker, root and stem was unrealistic considering she didn’t know how strong their grip was on the city, but she had been avoiding outright murder. Well, except for that bearlike man, anyway. But the energy that she now realised was based on the Void, was dangerous and countered her Radiance. Hmmm. Well, better to say that both energies countered each other. She wasn’t really certain about the relationship between Primordial energies. She knew Radiance and Luminescence worked together rather than fought, but she didn't know how the latter interacted with Void. 

Or was the proper term, Netherial? The knowledge was in Damien’s memories, but it wasn’t as if he provided samples of each Primordial energy source. That bit of information, other than Radiance at least, was barely more than an index entry. 

Either way, she assumed that each Primordial type was roughly equal to each other, so which one won was a matter of who used it. Her 2nd-incarnation was tethering at the edge of the 2nd Growth Stage and Actualisation, with only Radiant Physique overwhelmingly powerful in comparison. If she sought to cleanse Rakkisgrad, she’d have to recover that incarnation’s Anima reach to the same level as her Astorian incarnation. 

The way Yuriko’s Sword was cultivated was different from how Bladeless Sword and Unyielding Guardian Sword were done. It was actually nearly identical to Radiant Flying Swords. The latter was strengthened by creating Flying Sword manifestations around her Radiant Core, and the more there were, the farther the Ennoia progressed. After a certain number, the Ennoia would become a Colligia, though it would be limited by the Radiant Core’s level. Specifically, that Truth could not exceed Radiance, and must actually remain subservient. 

Her experiment with her incarnations was to see how the Ennoias could progress without being tied to Radiance, and there was still merit in doing so. Hmmm, come to think of it, she was also sure that once she created a Radiant Core for either of her incarnations, there would be no way to remove or reset it. Her true body should be enough, and she could use her incarnations to further her sword enlightenment. 

The time dilation between her true body, her Astorian body, and her Irisvaile body was starting to grate. The synchronisation between Shangria and Astoria had been distorted when Irvalla connected to it. The dilation was around one to one point two, with a fluctuation rate of an additional ten percent. Annoying, but it was unnecessary to partition. 

Nothing much happened at the moment anyway. She and her companions had finally returned to Shangria Station after more than a Season of harvesting, and they amassed enough resources to buy a mobile base, which was currently in the process of being fitted out. Their next delve would see them all the way to the core of Shangria, and supposedly, the portal hub that would bring them to where they needed to be. 

As for her Astorian self, the battle with Damien’s vessel, who was apparently the Irvallan Imperator, had left her incarnation wounded. It took most of the past sixty days to recover, and in the meantime, the war between the Republic of Astoria and the Irvallan Imperium had turned into a stalemate…sorta. The Altered humans fought the Imperium soldiers while the actual armed forces drew lines in the sand, fortified the area, and held a finger over the button that would send hundreds of ballistic missiles at the Irvallan beachheads. The only reason they haven’t so far, aside from the beachheads being distressingly close to Astorian cities, was the fact that there was intelligence of the Irvallans possessing a counterattack that would be just as devastating as an Astorian rain of fire. 

It was actually a conundrum for her. Quintessence was produced by those who admired her, and Ambrosia was a key resource she didn’t want to give up. Mutual destruction of both nations would mean she’d lose her source, too. At the moment, she used what influence she had to keep the missiles from flying, but she was wary of the Irvallans deciding that conquest was a lost cause. What could she do if they decided to burn the ground behind them as they retreated? 

The answer to her problems was always more power. But her incarnations could not progress beyond what they were already, without her true body stepping into Manifestation. And how far was she from Ascension? 

Her Anima reach expanded all the way to seven hundred and one paces. It would be seven hundred fifty without the weight of Damien’s memories, and it would take two hundred and forty-nine more days before she reached the limit. The other complication was in digesting the knowledge, but that was best done once she was at a thousand paces. She was sure her Intent and Will reserves were developed adequately, and it wasn’t as if she was going to stop working on them. And finally, she just created the Truth of Yuriko’s Sword, and advancing it from Ennoia to Colligia was only a matter of time. 

In short, less than a year was needed to advance. Hopefully, she’d be at that point by the time they reached Shangria’s core. 

Ah, there were also her distant relatives who wanted to meet and fight when they reached the fifth layer, but she honestly didn’t know if the Threads of Fate would align to really allow that meeting. On the other hand, she could just track them down using the dreamscape. That she’d met them and that there was a familial connection, no matter how distant, made doing that possible. 

Speaking of the dreamscape, she propelled all three of her selves into it. It was the work of a moment to identify the thread connecting to her Irisvaile self, and less than a minute to track Lucian down. 

Oh. He was just a hundred paces away and was moving towards her purloined apartment.