Soul magic was a complicated field of cultivation that wasn’t well understood by any of the disciplines that Yoshika was familiar with. All cultivation dealt with the soul—including body and mind cultivation—but common wisdom suggested that it was impossible to alter another person’s soul. The reality of it was more complicated, however.

Yoshika’s joint cultivation could be considered a form of magic that allowed one to alter another’s soul, for example. By joining Jia and Eui’s souls together, they could cultivate together, each of them influencing the other’s soul in turn. It was a loophole that the healing cults of Qin had made extensive use of—allowing them to perform advanced spiritual healing techniques by joining their souls to their patients.

On the darker side of things was demonism. While Lin Xiulan was quite explicit in her definition of demons as only those who had formed solid cores of deviant essence and used them to consume the souls of others, hers was a narrower definition than most. The cultivators of Qin largely seemed to consider anything with the potential to influence the soul as demonic—especially anything that could allow one practitioner to rob another of their power.

This was the excuse given when Qin outlawed dual cultivation and dismantled the healing cults. In theory, dual cultivation could be used in a predatory fashion, and there were even historical examples of men who trained women to act as ‘furnaces’ for their own cultivation, or rogue cultivators that would seduce others to steal their power. Such acts of vampirism were declared demonic, and outlawed.

Yoshika could understand the reasoning, but it disgusted her the way it had been twisted for political reasons to become yet another form of oppression. By imperial law, both Jia and Eui had been ‘demons’ before Eui had ever formed a core, and Lin Xiulan’s qi healing techniques were ‘predatory.’

Then, there was Seong Eunae’s power. Something that existed completely outside of the realm of conventional wisdom. She didn’t consume souls like a demon, nor did her power link her soul to that of her victims. Through her gaze, Eunae’s soulfire reached into a victim’s soul and changed it—cutting through the fabric of a person’s being like butter.

As Yan Yue had put it, it was a terrible exception to an otherwise comforting rule. A demon might steal one’s soul, and you might change if you willingly joined your soul to another, but nothing could damage or alter who you were from outside. The soul was inviolable.

But it wasn’t.

Eunae was a sweet girl who was as horrified and traumatized by the implications of her power as anyone else, but to Yoshika, Eunae’s gaze demonstrated one fundamental truth—the soul was not safe. If Eunae’s power could do it, then anyone could. They just hadn’t yet worked out how.

Before Eunae, there was Seong Heiran—a brutal tyrant who’d struck fear into the hearts of the entire continent before meeting her end centuries ago. Before Seong Heiran, there was the source of their power—the great spirit of the Kumiho, the nine-tailed fox. Not much was known about the time of the great spirits, but from what Yoshika had seen of her spiritual fragments—it wasn’t encouraging.

That was why they sat together now, studying Eunae’s power, practicing control, and learning the finer details of how it worked. Because one day, there would be another Seong Heiran—another Kumiho. If soul magic was possible, then there would inevitably be someone less sweet than Eunae to come along and abuse it. And when that time came—Yoshika wanted to be able to defend herself and those she loved.

“The first principles are simple enough—the soul is not inviolable, but it is extremely resilient.”

Ja Yun took the lead reviewing what they knew about Eunae’s power while Eunae prepared a ritual circle to demonstrate her latest breakthrough. Within the dim light of the meditation chamber, Yoshika paid close attention.

“My theory is that our souls are actually being damaged all the time by little things we don’t even notice. A bit of backlash from a cultivation misstep, poorly balanced meridians, excess corruption, or even something external like a magical brand burned into your forehead—uh, sorry Eui.”

Yoshika smiled wryly. It was a little painful so soon after her discussion with Xiulan, but she shook her head.

“It’s fine. That’s a good example.”

Ja Yun nodded.

“Right, and normally that’s all handled by a soul’s natural regeneration. Our souls have a certain shape that they are meant to be in, and cultivation is all about defining and strengthening that shape. We haven’t experimented with it directly, but Eunae’s power is reportedly much weaker against more advanced cultivators.”

Eunae paused in her drawing to look up and nod.

“When I was a child, my power couldn’t influence xiantian mages. My tutors reported an intense discomfort, but it faded entirely once they left. As I got older, that effect grew stronger until one day my mother restricted further tutoring to occur via correspondence. Misun became my de facto tutor after that.”

From her place in the corner of the room, Rika raised an eyebrow and whistled.

“I’m kinda surprised to hear they were so cautious, to be honest. If they were so worried, how did they ever agree to send you to the academy?”

Eunae pursed her lips.

“My aunt—the queen—is a shrewd woman. I had already been isolating myself for the better part of a year by then to avoid accidentally hurting anyone with my power. Sending me to the academy meant that either I’d prove that I really could be trusted not to abuse my power, or I would end up subverting several foreign agents that could be used in future political endeavors.”

Or, Queen Seong Eunhee was worried about her favorite niece growing so isolated and wanted to send her somewhere that she could learn to socialize without being shackled by her status. For some reason Eunae’s aunt wanted to keep her doting a secret, however, so Yoshika held her tongue.

Ja Yun cleared her throat to regain the attention of the others.

“Anyway, my theory is that cultivating ‘hardens’ the soul, so to speak, against this kind of damage. Eunae’s power has two factors that allow it to do what it does—first, the nature of Soulfire is specialized to cause intense damage directly to the soul. Like Fire melting Ice, or Plasma burning mana without so much as touching anything physical.

“The second is a sort of cauterizing effect. The analogy doesn’t quite work exactly, but the damage dealt by Eunae’s soulfire resists natural regeneration, kind of like how burns don’t bleed, but leave nasty scars. Most of our experimentation so far has been about learning the limitations of this.”

Eunae stood up and brushed herself off.

“I’m finished. Yun, are you ready for the demonstration?”

Ja Yun took a deep breath and nodded before stepping into the circle.

“Yoshika, you’re going to want to use your soul sight for this.”

Over the course of multiple sessions, Yoshika had refined the spells she used to enhance her ‘soul sense’ which allowed her to see into the spirit realm and visualize people’s souls. It was originally Hyeong Daesung who had created the formations that inspired it, and Yoshika had integrated that into her personal artifact—a pair of mismatched gloves—to take the effect even further.

Donning the gloves and activating the spells, the world around Yoshika transformed. Overlaid onto the physical world was the essence that all things were made of. In the physical realm, mana was an ethereal force that flowed invisibly through the world, but in the spiritual realm it was the opposite. Essence was more real than matter, which existed only as a ghostly echo.

Yoshika saw both at the same time, including the essence of her friends’ souls.

Ja Yun’s soul was extremely chaotic. Constantly shifting and contradicting itself in ways that bent the mind when Yoshika tried to understand it. Like a half-waking dream that connected one concept to another in a way that was unfathomable, yet paradoxically still logical.

Rika’s was steady and resolute—unwaveringly faithful to itself even as it fractured and split while somehow staying entirely cohesive. Each fraction contained the entirety of Rika’s soul, superimposed on itself in an endless fractal pattern.

Eunae’s was the simplest to understand. It was a deep blue core of power containing an endless storm of pale green fire. The fire stayed restrained within the core, except where Eunae consciously allowed clawed tendrils to slip out, held back by heavy chains.

Within her soulscape, Yoshika was able to visualize souls in more coherent patterns, but to her raw senses, they could be quite overwhelming to look at.

“I’m ready. What are you trying to do?”

Eunae swallowed nervously—somehow more anxious than even Ja Yun, who was the subject of the demonstration.

“We haven’t actually tested this before—we wanted you to be here in case something went awry—but the idea is to demonstrate the potential of fine control of my power by using it directly instead of trying to guide it with words and intentions.”

Yoshika nodded. Eunae’s power was granted to her by a living fragment of the Kumiho—her spiritual ancestor. Her own personal experience with the spirit fragments that lived within all half-spirits was that they had a strange sort of ancestral wisdom, but no actual ‘minds’ of their own. However, they presented themselves as twisted versions of their hosts.

Jia’s own cat spirit was like an extremely arrogant and prideful version of herself, combined with the instinctive wisdom that it had carried from generation to generation from her true ancestor. Eunae’s tended to take a malicious and sadistic view of her wants and needs, and expressed itself in a more ‘human’ way than most spirits.

Yoshika didn’t think Eunae’s Kumiho fragment had a will of its own, but its ancestral wisdom made it very good at pretending to. Their best theory was that her bewitching gaze worked the way it did because of the Kumiho’s malicious interpretation of her wishes. Directly controlling the power would bypass that.

“When I did this with Pan Jiaying, it was exhausting, but I believe that my practice has borne fruit enough for me to perform more delicate tasks. To begin, I’ll make a surface level change that Ja Yun will heal on her own. Ja Yun, do I have your consent to make you extremely angry at me?”

Ja Yun winced.

“Does it have to be that? I don’t want to say something I’ll regret again.”

Eunae smiled apologetically behind her veil.

“I promise not to hold anything you say against you. It’s crucial that I demonstrate that using my power this way does not come with the typical side effect of forcing the victim to love me unconditionally.”

“Yeah, okay—go ahead.”

To Yoshika’s surprise, Eunae did not lift her veil. Instead, the fiery claws of her soul reached out slowly towards Ja Yun, only to stop before they could make contact.

“Yun, open your soul to me please.”

Ja Yun’s cheeks flushed red, and she looked down at the ground.

“Y-yes mistress.”

Rika failed to hold back a chuckle, but the exchange created the opening Eunae needed, and the claws reached past the invisible barrier protecting Ja Yun’s soul and began their delicate work.

The chains restricting Eunae’s power remained loose as she performed the delicate operation. Each touch of the claws was feather-light, tracing intricate lines across the ‘surface’ of Ja Yun’s soul as though they were scribing a magic circle. Then, as quickly as it had begun, Eunae’s soul retreated from Ja Yun, leaving only the thin scars behind—already beginning to heal over on their own.

Though the changes were minor, the effect was immediate and dramatic. Ja Yun’s face turned a different kind of red and she stepped forward aggressively.

“I told you I didn’t want to be angry!”

Yoshika was startled by how raw Ja Yun’s voice was—the emotions flowing from her soul were palpable.

“I don’t care about proving your power doesn’t make me love you! I just don’t want to say something stupid and hurt you! You never listen to me!”

Rika stepped in and gave Ja Yun a hug.

“Hey, it’s okay. We do listen, Yun—you agreed to this way ahead of time.”

The embers of Ja Yun’s ire died down a little as her soul smoothed over the last of the scars, but she had already dredged up genuine grievances.

“I know that! But you know I would do anything for you—that’s not fair! And what’s even the point of proving that Eunae’s power doesn’t make me fall in love with her when I’m already—”

“Okay! Let’s leave it there, shall we? You didn’t want to say something you’d regret.”

Eunae’s face matched Ja Yun’s as they both turned red from embarrassment. Yoshika was starting to feel like she was intruding.

“Uh, should we go?”

Ja Yun shook her head vigorously.

“No! Sorry—we knew things might get a little...weird with that one, but there’s something else that we need to show you.”

Rika raised an eyebrow.

“Are you sure you’re up for it?”

“Yeah. If it goes as planned, the second demonstration should actually be a lot easier on me.”

Yoshika turned her attention to Eunae, who was already sweating a bit from her exertion of her power.

“Will you be okay to keep going?”

Eunae nodded.

“I’ve practiced for this. That was what we call a surface level change—damage that the soul can heal on its own, even after my power cauterizes it. Every point on the ‘surface’ of the soul heals at the same rate simultaneously, but heavier damage to a single point goes deeper, and takes exponentially longer to heal. Deep enough damage becomes self-sustaining—it will last forever.”

“And you’re about to demonstrate that? Is this safe?”

To her surprise, it was Ja Yun that nodded in confirmation.

“With Eunae’s breakthrough in fine control of her power, it’s actually even safer than the surface level demonstration. The change will be deeper, but it will also be much smaller. She can permanently change a trivial aspect of me that nobody will even notice. And more importantly—she can change it back!”

“You seem awfully excited about all this.”

Ja Yun blushed.

“I just think it’s really fascinating, and I’m happy to see Eunae learning to take control of the power that’s made her life so miserable. Plus it’s kinda...”

She averted her eyes and coughed.

“A-anyway, let’s just get on with the demonstration, okay?”