Chapter 4235: Tainted Snow (Part 2)

"The kids sure would have appreciated it, Aunt Loka." Solus chuckled. "Poor Elysia. Jirni was right. Our baby girl’s birthday is the worst day of the year for her. By the way, you have yet to explain to me why you want so desperately to meet Ral."

"It’s nothing nefarious, Solus, I swear." Despite Lochra’s words, the honor guards tensed up and adjusted their grip on their weapons. "As you know, I am over seven hundred years late to discover my apex form.

"The Demon Dirge that took place on Raldarak’s birth gave me a few clues, but even after a month of intense practice, I’ve gotten nowhere. Unlike Lith and Elysia, Ral has a perfectly developed Indech side, and I hope to learn something from him.

"Who knows, maybe he could trigger another resonance effect with me and point me in the right direction." She waved at the baby boy’s six streaks and his different colored eyes.

"It’s a good theory, Loka. I wish you luck." Solus nodded. "Why are you staring at me like that, Malyshka?"

"No reason." Baba Yaga too found it weird that both of Lith’s children had the six colored streaks in their hair, but she had a different explanation. "I’m just glad to see that you are steadily recovering your strength."

"I know, right?" Solus brimmed with joy. "Ever since Lith and I started the project to Awaken the Trawn Woods, the world energy’s output from both the mana geyser in the clearing and the one beneath the Mansion is steadily increasing.

"Even better, the high-density world energy area that surrounds the geysers is slowly expanding in every direction, including Lutia’s. It’s only a matter of time until I can do more than using the Warp and Master Mirror while at home.

"Lith and I will benefit from the empowering effects of the tower even while at Rena’s!"

"I’m happy for you, dear. I only wish we had the same certainty about your recovery." Menadion sighed. "According to my original plan, the tower was supposed to repair both your mana core and life force over the span of a few months.

"Yet I died soon after bonding you to the tower, and since that moment, the tower has cannibalized itself to keep you alive. I have no idea if the centuries of delay had any adverse effect on your condition, or if the tower is still capable of restoring you.

"In a few months, it will be seventeen years since the day Lith found you, yet neither your life force nor mana core is fully healed."

"Have faith in yourself and your masterpiece, Ripha." Baba Yaga replied. "I believe that by the time Solus recovers the bright violet, the repairs of the tower will be complete.

"I don’t know about Solus’ mana core, but her life force can and is recovering. The wondrous effects the tower had on the cracks in Lith’s life force during their fusions are proof enough."

Healing a cracked life force was an arduous task, but it was something that all those who achieved Lichhood did and that Baba Yaga had done for most of her Firstborns. Sealing a cracked mana core, however, was a different story.

It was something that only Guardians and Forbidden Magic could allegedly achieve.

Even Baba Yaga needed to replace the cracked core with an artificial blood core, and only after it became full-red would an undead be able to resurrect themselves at the expense of all their accumulated power.

Ripha had spent years studying the workings of life vessels and Baba Yaga’s undead, and believed to have found the answer. Yet it was just a theory she had hoped never to put into practice.

The old enchantment of the Infirmary gave her no certainty, but at least she knew its runes and how it was supposed to operate. The new one, instead, was as foreign as it was incomplete.

Until the tower finished rebuilding itself, the First Ruler of the Flames had no way to know how her original design had been altered in the wake of her untimely death.

"Do you mind shutting your mouths for five minutes?" Lochra kept her voice low and soothing, but her mouth was twisted in a snarl. "I too am worried about Epphy, but after waiting hours for this moment, I’d like to have a bit of time for myself.

"Your constant yapping is distracting Raldarak and me."

After the three women remained silent for ten seconds, Silverwing tried to get the baby boy’s undivided attention.

"I’ll be honest with you, little one, I have no idea what I’m doing here." She lifted him to her eye level, making him coo. "I’m clutching at straws, but I hope you can help me. Trigger a resonance between us, show me the way, anything will do.

"I’m willing to take you as my master for the next 100 years if this works. Do we have a deal?"

"Mama." Raldarak grabbed Silverwing’s face with his tiny hands and rubbed his head against her.

Silverwing used her breathing technique, Ascension, to study Raldarak’s life force and connect her own with it. She breathed with his same rhythm until even their hearts beat in sync.

"Okay, he’s adorable, but this is not working." Silverwing felt nothing but the baby’s warmth on her skin. "Can you please make him turn into an Indech, Epphy?

"Yes, but my name is Solus." A quick mind link and a blanket of hair, and Raldarak happily shapeshifted.

"Thanks, Solus." The First Magus nodded. "Here goes everything."

She studied the evolved human life force and tried to rearrange her own to resemble it. Silverwing used no Body Sculpting spell, only her breathing technique.

She hoped that the connection with the baby Indech would allow her to achieve her apex form, or at least show her the order with which she had to trigger the dormant mana organs in her life force in order to bridge the abyssal gap between her human and apex form.

Silverwing felt a faint echo of what she had experienced during the last Demon Dirge. Something in her body stirred, wishing to take the first step towards a form she instinctively knew was similar yet different from an Indech.

The First Magus held onto that feeling, injecting massive amounts of energy into the few mana organs that her human form shared with Raldarak. Power swelled in her chest, but no change took place.

She felt as if she was trying to push a loaded cart while two horses were bridled on its front. In other words, she was doing everything wrong.

"This was an utter failure, but it was worth the wait." Silverwing sighed, interrupting the connection. "I had the right idea, but I executed it the worst way possible. My apex form is rank 4, Ral’s Indech is rank 3, and I’m stuck at rank 0.

"The resonance is there, but his life force is too different from mine. I need a perfect rank 1 human to identify the first step. Then I’ll need a rank 2, and only once I’m done with that can I ask for Ral’s help again. How close is Quylla to undoing the Fallen state of the people of Zelex?"

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