Master Of None

2174  2174. Mixed Boundaries

The reason that Midnight was so focused on the manas and how she could sense it was simple. She was focused on it because she could feel the changes throughout Walker and her connections. The bond that the two shared was sharing their senses to a degree along with some mana. While the pair had never utilized their connection to bring manas between them at large amounts, it had happened naturally for their entire relationship. The very same with Onyx's bond with them too. However, because they had entered the elemental planes, there had been more manas around them at all times. Because of this, they had noticed that the manas flowing between them was growing even more than what they had been handling until now. Since Walker was picking up on the more mysterious aspects of manas, Midnight had started to grasp them as well. While her focus remained on the basics of manas and how they reacted with her body, and her dragon nature, Walker had begun to focus on the ways that manas changed one another. He had just seen the poison elemental plane. That alone was something very different. The amount of the elemental manas that gathered to create such a perfectly unique fused form of mana was incredible. Until this point, poisons had been something that he believed to stand alone. Not have a form of mana that also represented them. But here he was with the subset of manas, poison mana, being a result of various forms of manas working in perfect unison with one another. Other manas might come to be because of this. He had mixed manas together to create mud, could that be its own mana too? Or could he look at the way that ice formed and think of that as a subset of water mana along with wind and water mana? Or would things change because they were also mixed together?

The reason that this was so clearly in his mind was that he had already begun to move with the light devouring dragon as their lead. Midnight was taking the lead in the sense that she would handle the dangers that presented themselves. Walker knew that she had been itching to fight properly after seeing Remey take down a powerful undead as if it was nothing. The elemental planes that they were moving toward were nothing normal. They were elemental planes that had not yet been melded with the other elemental planes properly. More like this was a holding area for manas that had yet to acclimate or calm down enough. Just as the poison dragon was trapped as a prisoner while it adapted and grew, these planes were trapped too. They were here so that they could develop or fuse with the elemental planes in to one. Por they would become a unique boundary elemental plane that would make everything more stable. From what Walker could feel, these were pieces to a greater puzzle. Like the origin race was doing more than just looking for new forms of manas. As if they were using these developing elemental planes to expand the orderly existence that they enjoyed and knew. But maybe it was just a feeling and only that. Right this second, his mana senses caught on to a bit of darkness mana. The mana was flowing nearby because of the dark elemental plane which was right there. However, Walker knew that this wasn't the case of the mana that he sensed. Right this cond, he was sensing dark mana stretching itself out. Dark mana was moving in a thin line, almost like a strong through another plane nearby. The plane that Walker sensed was different in the way that it felt as if it was also reaching out. But he had no idea what mana it was. From how he could see it, this plane was an odd mix that seemed closer to space mana. "We are moving between elemental planes now. We will have to handle anything we encounter with the greatest of focus. We may not meet what anyone could consider as real." Now this made the entire party feel that the light dragonoids and light devouring dragon were more knowledgeable about this place than what they could be right now. Specifically, because they all knew that this place was dangerous with just the manas that they could sense. 
"There are manas here that do not have names yet, others that require a greater deal of discretion due to those within. Beings that are sealed there for a reason. They are not prisoners, but monsters or intelligent beings that can not get along within the balance and may take thousands of years to be able to do so."

For a small moment, Walker and the others thought that this was cruel. There could be beings like the elemental spirits trapped within these elemental planes. Or there could be monsters that didn't even understand why they were trapped here at all. It depended on the elemental plane. Regardless, it was unfair for them to be trapped there for years on end. However, the risk of unbalancing the elemental planes was very high. If they were not cooperative with the goal to maintain balance, they could cause a war by pushing through whatever elemental planes they should not be in, or worse, they could literally change the flow of the elemental planes. It was clear that Su was considering this before they saw what Walker's focus was on. "What is it? Is that dark mana and space mana?" her sense did not betray her. She was familiar with both. "It's a dark elemental plane maybe the size of a house reaching out to a plane with mixed dark and space mana. I would call it some sort of shifting shadow plane? I don't think it's balanced enough to be unique. Stopping it would ruin it though." Walker could see the delicate relationship between these two planes as they mixed. More like the space plane was absorbing the dark plane instead of the small dark plane joining the larger dark elemental plane. "This entire place is just made of these planes, so are we just in the middle, like a mix of it all? Isn't that just like where we came from?" Since Gil understood how the world was a mix of manas, it made sense that his mind went here.

"Our home is calm." Onyx chose to think that the difference between here and the world was the activity of manas. To be fair, that fit in a way. "This place has the manas that leak from these planes. The boundary is too polluted to be well established." This was not the first time the light devouring dragon had been here before. "I think I understand it. Because this isn't flowing the same way as the rest, there isn't a chance to develop any set boundaries with set forms of manas. This is intentional though. So that it can all find a balance naturally rather than forcefully."

The fight devouring dragon did not comment. There was a slight bit of respect though. One that told Walker that this might have been something told to him by those in contact with other origin beings. "There's a broken skeleton here." Su's voice cut through things as she pointed out the skeleton ribs near the strands of dark mana flowing in to the space plane. n/ô/vel/b//jn dot c//om

"It looks degraded, it got caught in the pure dark mana without any resistance. We will be fine though. It means there are still some skeletons that the immortal king is using to test his path." These skeletons were just tools to the immortal king. It was worse and worse.

"Then that was a failed attempt to raise an undead then." The tension increased as Gil notched an arrow to aim toward the still loving skeletons surrounding a spear larger mass of monster.

The light dragonoids behind them all prepared for a battle. They could sense the unease in Gil's stance. They felt that he wasn't acting like this in fear but because the unknown thing ahead of them was certainly dangerous. "It looks like one of the shadow web tarantulas. It's missing the shadow hairs on its body. Its legs are also damaged." Having the light devouring dragon proved to be useful again. He recognized this monster and saw the differences here. "It's moving." Midnight warned them before growling a warning out loud. Clearly, she noticed more movement than what Walker had seen.

"It's mana is still active. It might be nearly dead. But the skeletons were left to handle it. They were torturing it to death." Walker hated this as he began to buff Midnight before she faced the skeletons. She would handle them before they decided to save or end this monster's life.

Cautiously, Midnight prepares to battle. Her focus was entirely on the weak skeletons in front of her. ...

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Your gift is the motivation for my creation. Give me more motivation!

1King_Rep1