I was staring at the script that had made short work of a tree, now drawn into a patch of dirt with a stick. It hadn’t quite worked as intended, but the reason for the failure wasn’t obvious. To an extent it had done what we wanted, however. It did make the tree’s mana disappear from our vision. We might’ve been on the right track, we would just have to fix this issue.

Berla had decided to do maintenance on her weapons, while Riala had sat down by my side, to listen to my one-sided discussion with Miles. As always, he wasn’t short on theories about what might’ve happened.

“You think the tree overloaded itself with mana?”

‘It’s a possibility. We saw the mana vanish completely from our vision, it was all put back into the vessel immediately. But maybe the mana needs to be able to leave the tree. And without that outlet, the mana destroyed it from the inside. The water source on the other hand was destroyed under the strain we put on it... I think the mana needs to be balanced carefully.’

“Hm... what’s the alternative then? Could the amount just be reduced, instead of stopping it completely?”

‘We could test that, though I’m not hopeful.’

The problem with my idea was that it would presumably still lead to an overload. If you put all mana that streams out of the vessel right back in, it would destroy itself. Slowing this process down would give you more time, but it would most likely still happen eventually.

Regardless of the chance of success, we decided to give it a try and went back to the treeline. At first, the results the revised script caused looked promising, as the tree’s visible mana lessened by about half. It didn’t take long, however, until it started dying as well. The process had just taken a little longer. Already standing at a safe distance, we watched the second tree fall to the ground.

‘Back to the drawing board.’

It was clear that this idea wasn’t going to work. We couldn’t stop the mana, but just letting it stream out of us wasn’t going to work either. We needed to do something else with it. It just had to go somewhere.

“Can I do the next tree?” Riala asked, her eyes signaling that she wanted to fell a tree as well.

“I think this was the last one for now,” I said.

Looking down at her, I thought back to a script she had tried two days ago, while we were teaching her a few sigils. She had used it to create a wall of water droplets, spreading the effect thin over a large area. If we were to apply this to our mana, would that solve the problem?

“Hey, Miles. How about scattering it over a large area? Like Riala did with the water the other day?”

‘Huh, interesting idea. The concentration might be a factor, like on those “gods.” Let’s try it!’

We walked over to the next tree and I handed the chalk over to Riala, knowing that she wouldn’t be happy until she could test a new script as well. “Can you draw one like your rain script? But with the external mana as the input?”

“Okay!”

She went to work immediately. I didn’t quite understand how she was improving this quickly. It had only been a few days since she started studying, but she understood Omega almost as well as me. I can’t let her beat me, I thought.

With the last stroke she made, the script activated and the mana scattered over a wider area. It looked a little like fog. The tree appeared healthy, just with less mana surrounding it.

While we marveled at the promising result, Berla startled us when she suddenly stood directly behind us, dagger at the ready, and yelled “What did you do!?”

“We’re just trying different scripts,” I said in confusion as I glanced back at her. “What’s wrong?”

“It feels like a beast is here!” she said.

Interestingly, the scattered mana around the tree did not have the desired effect. Instead of making something less threatening, we had created a “tree beast.” This could be useful for distractions, I thought. It was very interesting how much of an effect different mana concentrations would have on normal humans.

‘I think the idea is good, it just needs to be tweaked. We should try scattering the mana even more, to see what happens. Either it will get worse, or we’ll reach a point where the mana isn’t perceivable anymore.’

“Should we try it on us?”

‘Sounds good.’

Since this script didn’t have any negative effects on the vessel, it would be safe to test it on ourselves, and to accurately judge its effect, we would need Berla to confirm that we had stopped being frightening anyway.

I walked over to the fire, took the ink, and carefully drew the new script on my arm. After leaving most of the experimentation to Miles over the past couple days, it was a lot of fun to be directly involved once more.

As I made the last stroke, the mana around us started to lessen, just like it had on the tree. Instead, I could see an almost unperceivable fog around us. There was a limit to how much we could stretch the output, so if this didn’t work, we would need a new plan. I looked over at Berla, to see what her reaction was, but instead of looking at me, her eyes darted around the air, not focusing on anything in particular.

“How is it, Berla?” I asked.

“It’s weird. You don’t feel dangerous anymore, but it feels like there’s something in the air,” she said. “Do you know how Rulers sometimes feel? It’s... similar, but not quite the same. Does that make sense?”

“Hm, I think so. Does that mean... this would work?” I asked with hopeful eyes.

“You will still draw attention to yourself I would imagine, but nobody will flee from you,” she said with a smile. “Good job.”

It felt like a huge burden had been lifted from my shoulders. Not being able to enter a town ever again had been one of my greatest fears, even though I had pushed the feeling to the side for the time being. I teared up slightly, as I took a deep breath. “We will be okay...”

‘You won’t inspire confidence if you start crying now.’

“Oh, shut up,” I said with a chuckle.

***

When the High Priest arrived at the living quarters, he saw a slew of priests praying in the hallway. They were kneeling a few meters away from an open door, which he knew belonged to the room of Oryn Tilia. He had yet to be informed what exactly had happened, as the priest who had come to get him didn’t have any concrete information either, but this display was clearly unusual.

“Out of the way,” he said, and the priests in his path quickly moved to the side of the hallway to let him through. As he walked on and got closer to the room, he started to feel the ominous air that had been described to him. This air... out of his room... he thought.

The High Priest knew what Oryn was spending the majority of his free time on, and how excited he had been about the boy and what his knowledge could mean for the scripture sigil research. It was his great passion, and naturally he would continue his  work, even after the boy had escaped. However, the High Priest had never expected Oryn to make any meaningful progress. Not after their knowledge hadn’t advanced for hundreds of years. Did he do it...?

Despite his nervousness, he tried to move as gracefully as was expected of him and approached the door to look inside. The first person his eyes fell on was Oryn, sitting on the floor, while staring at his hands. Focusing entirely on him, the High Priest didn’t feel anything particularly special. Oryn seemed a little different, but if he had become a living water source, like the boy and the girl had, he should’ve been as frightening as a beast.

On the other end of the scale was the woman lying by Oryn’s side. She didn’t feel like a beast either. Instead, she felt divine. Not quite like a god, but still somewhere far beyond a human being. She was the reason the priests in the hallway were praying. They thought her a goddess.

“Oryn, w-what happened here?” the High Priest stammered.

Worshippers were less affected by the energy beasts and gods were giving off, but even the High Priest couldn’t stand before a god and feel nothing, and while Aelene wasn’t quite on that same level, he was already struggling slightly.

“Sir,” Oryn said as he looked up at the High Priest, a mix of disappointment and confusion in his eyes. “I believe I have recreated the scripture that turned Mr. Remor and Ms. Fera into living water sources. But... it didn’t work on me.”

He explained to the High Priest what he was seeing. He told him about the mist that surrounded everyone, and especially the vast amount of it around Aelene. He himself, however, was lacking. He didn’t have an amount that was noticeably different from others, and the script that he had hastily written on his hand after regaining consciousness had produced an amount of water so miniscule, that he might as well just spit on the floor instead.

With a hanging head he glanced over at the unconscious Aelene. “She is different from the other two, right? What does she feel like to you, sir?”

The High Priest was stunned silent. Oryn’s experiment had turned one of his priestesses into a divine being. None of the clergy would believe her to be anything less when they saw her like this. Ignoring Oryn’s question, an abundance of other questions flooded into his mind.

Did the gods have a hand in giving her this energy?

Why would they give it to random children?

What can Alene do in this state?

Could anyone with scripture and a water source do this?

If the gods weren’t involved, what did this mean for their religion?

Are gods even truly higher powers?

If she is godlike, can you become an actual god this way?

How do I explain a divine being living among the citizens?

In a split second, the High Priest’s entire world view was turned on its head. Questions that no Worshipper should ever have under normal circumstances suddenly appeared extremely vital to him.

“Sir?” Oryn asked after a moment.

Slowly coming out of his daze, the High Priest finally responded. “She is divine. The priests are already praying in the hallway.”

“That’s what I thought,” Oryn said with a sad smile.

He looked at Oryn, sitting on the floor, with downcast eyes and disappointment in his voice. However, to the High Priest, these feelings were misplaced. “You have done this, Oryn Tilia. You. Be proud of that.”

He looked at the High Priest in surprise. Oryn had never seen him so out of it. Instead of his usual, pompous self, he seemed overwhelmed and compassionate. The priest’s expression quickly turned to one of happiness, as he came to realize that the High Priest was right. He had accomplished something remarkable, and this wasn’t the end. It was just the beginning.